I was walking from the cafeteria back to the lab thinking about the difficult relationship my daughters have with their birth mother. I sighed and thought “Oh well, there is always room for hope!.”
Suddenly, I realized, there is always room for hope in any situation. I felt like shouting it from the rooftop! There really is always room for hope.
How do I know this? There are countless examples in history as well as my own experiences.
One person who had a profound affect on my life is Viktor Frankl who was a neurologist and psychiatrist. He wrote a book titled ‘Man’s Search for Meaning” after surviving imprisonment in the concentration camps during the Holocaust. His wife, father, mother and brother all died in those camps.
There are two quotes from Viktor’s book which help me explain why there is always room for hope.
In order to believe there is always room for hope, we need to understand at least two ideas.
Quote #1
This quote from Viktor’s book helps me even today:
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are are challenged to change ourselves.”
There are many times in life when we have no control over our circumstances or the people who influence our life. As as prisoner in a German concentration camp, Viktor had little control over the Germans or his living situation. However, he did not remain stuck in hopelessness.
Viktor worked to change himself in order to survive his circumstances. Just as children living in abusive situations adapt to survive, so we can too.
This reasoning applies to all of us including those in more mundane situations.
An example from my own life: I suffer chronic pain from several health conditions. I often lose sleep or can’t participate in some family functions because of the pain. For a long time, I struggled with believing that I would never get relief.
However, when I realized there could be a cure soon, my attitude dramatically improved. As a consequence, I am able to gift myself hope.
Quote #2
Viktor put the responsibility and the power in our hands when he stated:
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
In other words, to make a belief our own, we have to take responsibility for our beliefs. Nothing and no one can take away our ability to choose our beliefs.
When I believe, then I am able to take action. My belief empowers me to go about my day.
Sometimes, this is easier said than done. I have found that I have to make the decision to have hope on a conscious level continually. The more often I choose to believe, the deeper I believe. It follows then, the deeper I believe, the deeper I hope.
You may think “what if a cure or better treatments never come? How long will you hope?”
I fully recognize that a cure may not come in my lifetime.
I have hope because I choose hope. Having the freedom to make that choice is very powerful indeed.
Let me know what you think in the comment section below.
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