Here’s my thing about hope: I happen to think it’s poison.
Hope is just another way of wishing that what is, wasn’t. Or wishing what is now, always will be. I don’t like this thing, so I’m going to hope for something better. Or I do like this, and so I need it to feel permanent and unchangeable. And that wish is where the suffering starts.
Reality – expectations = suffering.
That’s the whole equation. It doesn’t matter what you plug into it. A person you’re dating. A job you’re waiting to hear back from. A diagnosis you’re waiting on. A creative project you’ve put your whole self into. The equation holds.
What I’d Suggest Instead
Instead of hope, I’d encourage openness.
Say it’s a person. Be open to how you feel about them now. Be open to how it unfolds. Be open to them coming back into your life, or not. Be open to someday wanting something more, or not. Enjoy the feelings that come from a good date, a lovely evening, or the years we DO get, without grasping onto where they lead or when they end.
Say it’s a job. Be open to getting it, or not, and let both of those be fine to sit with before you know which one is true. As the brilliant Cicely Tyson said, what’s for you in this life, you will get. And what is not for you, you will not get. And that fear of layoff? You have the job today, right now, until you don’t. Neither worry nor hope will change the outcome.
Say it’s your health. Be open to good news and be open to hard news, and don’t spend time in the waiting room pre-living the stress of outcomes. Take a moment here and there to appreciate the health you have today. Or as Thich Nhat Hanh says, your non-toothache.
Say it’s something you made, something you’re putting out into the world. Be open to it landing, and be open to it not landing, without deciding ahead of time which one means you failed. Your creativity is self-valid. It is valid because you put the time into creating it, and hopefully enjoyed the process!
The most anxiety you’ll ever create for yourself comes from grasping onto hope. It’s what keeps you somewhere you know you shouldn’t stay, whether that’s a relationship, a job, or a version of a plan that stopped fitting your life a while ago. It’s like trying to grip water as it comes out of the faucet. I welcome you to try, lol. The tighter you close your hand, the less water you hold. It just sprays out the sides and now your sleeve is wet too.
On Signs, Tarot, and the Future
There’s nothing wrong with looking for signs. Nothing wrong with enjoying tarot, or a dream that felt like it meant something, or the horoscope, or the gut feeling you got when you walked into the interview. The problem is the grasping: investing your whole happiness into what the cards, or the dream, or the coincidence seems to say.
You cannot predict the future. Any suggestions life offers us, through dreams, tarot, gut feelings, a stranger’s offhand comment, are imperfect. They’re sent through sea glass. It’s fuzzy. And from it, we try to create images that are sharp and definite, because sharp and definite feels safer than not knowing.
That sets us up for fear, and thus grasping, and thus disappointment. Same equation, different coat. It shows up the same way whether you’re waiting on a text back or waiting on test results.
But isn’t hopelessness a bad sign? To be clear, I’m not advocating for hopelessness anymore than I am hope. They are two sides of the same coin. What I’m suggesting is stepping outside of the hope trap all together, and into presence instead.
Just like we hope something will change or stay the same, hopelessness believes nothing ever will. Both rub up against our reality: everything is always changing and flowing.
The Practice
Just enjoy it. Enjoy the twitterpated feelings, whether they’re about a person or a possibility. Enjoy the sadness and the disappointment too, because they’re proof you’re here, feeling something real. Enjoy the unknown and the uncertain future, even when you can’t see it clearly. Enjoy the memories you already have, whatever they’re from. Enjoy the friendship, the offer, the outcome, if that’s what it becomes.
Detachment from outcome is the whole game, no matter what the outcome is attached to. You’re allowed to feel everything, fully. Just let go of needing it to land a particular way.
We’re meant to enjoy what happens, even when it doesn’t immediately look like joy.
-D