Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.
Senator Robert F. Kennedy
Welcome to Ruthlessly Hopeful
I want to create a kinder and more hope-filled world, and I hope you do, too. Ruthlessly Hopeful is here to inform, inspire and motivate you to be more hopeful and do good.
We are a community dedicated to increasing our individual and collective sense of hope and nurturing the hope of others. Along the way, we are trying to do good while spreading hope.
So What is Hope?
Hope is the belief that the future will be better than the present, and I have the power to make it so.
According to research, hope is a way of thinking and not a feeling. That is good news, because it means we can all learn to be more hopeful.
Also, hope gives us purpose and contributes to our well being.
Keep scrolling to learn more.
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Hope consists of:
Desirable goals
Pathways to those goals
Willpower to achieve those goals.
The absence of any one of these will diminish our sense of hope.
Hope requires:
Self-efficacy which is the belief that you can achieve goals you set for yourself.
Agency which is the ability to choose what actions to take and feel like you have some control over your life.
Hope runs on imagination. As one researcher put it, if we can’t imagine it, we have no chance of achieving it.
Most importantly, hope requires action, otherwise it’s just wishful thinking.
The Pathway to Hope: It Starts With Us!
Research shows that hope is one of the single best predictors of well-being across a lifespan.
The pathway to hope starts with being intentional about cultivating:
Awareness - Being attentive to what is going on within and around us rather than being on autopilot.
Connection - Feeling connected to, caring about and having supportive relationships and experiences with other people.
Insight - Understanding how our thoughts, beliefs and emotions shape who we are and are experiences.
Purpose - Applying core values and motivations in our daily life.
The Center for Healthy Minds, through their extensive research and collaboration with other researchers, have identified these four skills as essential to well-being.
When we nurture these skills in ourselves and others, we experience more hope and well-being.
But that’s not all! Cultivating them opens us to more joy, gratitude, kindness, empathy and much more.
These skills help us navigate adversity by giving us the strength to sit with uncomfortable emotions as we go through and make meaning of it.
They cultivate hope by:
Clarifying goals and the pathways to them.
Providing and sustaining the mental, physical and emotional energy (willpower) needed to pursue our goals.
Overcoming obstacles that can arise while on the path to achieving our goals.
Identifying alternative pathways to our goals or re-goal when obstacles cannot be overcome.
Developing a community of support that nurtures our hope and well-being and gives us the chance to reciprocate.
Awareness, connection, insight and purpose are also important leadership skills.
Most importantly, they help us be better humans!
If “Plan A” doesn’t work, the alphabet has 25 more letters - 204 if you’re in Japan.
Claire Cook
Research shows……
Hopeful people are more productive and experience better health.
Hopeful students earn at least one letter grade better than their less hopeful peers.
Hope is measurable and people can learn how to hope.
Hope is not a solo sport. Dr. Chan Hellman, a leading hope researcher, calls it a “social gift” because hope is nurtured through our connectedness to others.
Hope is one of the things that makes us human, because no other living creature can hope as humans do.
Hope is contagious. You can actually be more hopeful by spending time with hopeful people. So let’s spread it around!
An interview with Habon Abdulle, founder and executive director of Ayada Leads, about her journey to it, and the work they do to support women from the African diaspora to fully participate in political and civic life.