How to Hope in Uncertain Times: Finding Strength Through Change

I have been thinking about how it may be possible to hope in times like these.

Everywhere I look, systems seem to be exposed and crumbling. Ultra-wealthy men, who have so much power in our corporatist country, have apparently felt justified in harming and raping countless women. The President’s apparent lack of executive function, not to mention lack of mental and physical health, has led to numerous short-sighted, harmful decisions - most recently going to war with Iran. The ineffective Congress and the partisan Supreme Court are not operating as I was taught they should operate in grade school.

Climate is changing, prices are up, the divide between the poor and the rich is becoming startling. It is hard to imagine how this ends well. I cannot shake the feeling that our political and economic systems will only get more corrupt, and more poorly managed.

Despite how bad it all feels, I believe we all desire to make sense of what is happening, and not curl up into the fetal position during fits of depressive hopelessness. Hope is (usually) what you have when you can see the light at the end of the tunnel, when you can imagine something better while being grounded in reality.

I cannot, in good faith, imagine something better right now. But I do think it is still possible to hope.

After recently finishing “The Parable of the Sower” by Octavia Butler (found in the “Horror” section of Powell’s Books in Portland), I became infatuated with Lauren’s Earthseed writings. Primarily, the notion that GOD IS CHANGE.

I think hope is related to trust. Even if there cannot be a better imagined future, you can still decide to trust, or have faith, in an idea or belief. Lauren had to watch as her entire community, all the people she loved, got burned to ashes. Her prospect of heading north was full of danger, and it was unclear what survival could look like in her dystopian world. Yet she developed a trust in the fact that change is inevitable. No matter how horrible the present conditions are, she could trust completely that things were going to change. This trust gave her hope and an inner resilience that allowed her to rebuild a community and survive against many odds.

Having faith in change does not mean you should expect things to always get better. Unfortunately life seems to have equal shares of pleasure and pain. Having faith in change is a way to detach from this rollercoaster of good and bad, pleasure and pain. If you can trust in the impermanence of life, that also means you can survive, and ideally thrive, as life goes through it’s natural ups and downs because of inner equanimity and strength that grows from trust.

The one fact of life that I have full confidence in, and that I can surrender my trust to, is that things change. If I can untether myself from obsessing over everything that is going wrong, and release my dichotomous obsession over things that are pleasurable, I land precisely in the present moment. By releasing these attachments, I can become fully open to change and fully open to life as it naturally unfolds. This feels inherently hopeful to me.

There have been a number of recent changes that I have tried my best to remain gracious to as they have unfolded for me. Right now Meditation Club is on hiatus, and I am throwing my energy into teaching school counseling master’s students and other creative pursuits. I am now a Licensed Mental Health Counselor Associate and I am fine tuning my counseling skills so that one day I can branch out into private therapy practice. I hope to keep writing here intermittently to reflect on mindfulness as a spiritual practice and how it relates to my work in the world.

Finding where our work is in this troubling world is such an important task. This quote from James Clear’s most recent newsletter struck a meaningful chord for me on that topic:

Musician Nick Cave on the power of your everyday conduct:

“Rather than feel impotent and useless, you must come to terms with the fact that as a human being you are infinitely powerful, and take responsibility for this tremendous power. Even our smallest actions have potential for great change, positively or negatively, and the way in which we all conduct ourselves within the world means something. You are anything but impotent, you are, in fact, exquisitely and frighteningly dynamic, as are we all, and with all respect you have an obligation to stand up and take responsibility for that potential. It is your most ordinary and urgent duty.”

Source: The Red Hand Files, Issue #216

Thanks for being here and let me know if this resonated with you!