Tom Atlee on the P2P Virtue of ‘Potent Hope’.

Excerpted from Tom Atlee:

“From what I can tell, most people think that hope is a kind of wishing that things will turn out ok: “I hope Pat likes me!” “I hope the brakes hold!” In some varieties of hope, there is also a bit of (optimistic) belief that things WILL turn out ok, usually expressed as “having” or “getting” hope: “I have a lot of hope in this new president. S/he gives me a lot of hope.”

Again, I find myself indulging in both of these forms of hope but, again, they feel passive, so I call them “passive hope”. When I lose them – when I become sad, disappointed, or disillusioned – that’s when the word “hopeless” feels real to me. But it, too, is passive.

In contrast, there seems to be a whole different kind of hope – a realm of hopefulness I call “potent hope”. Potent hope, too, has many forms but all of them are active, intentional, and grounded in the positive potential we can observe in people and the world. People with potent hope don’t claim to know what will happen, but they do claim good reason to take action, to move with the positive forces in and around them.

And what I’ve noticed is that when I find myself losing whatever form of potent hope I’ve had, I slide into passive hopelessness, because there is no potent form of hopelessness. But potent hope is addictive, so I usually soon find myself seeking another form of potent hope that is authentic for me in my new state and, with its help, I find myself rising to the occasion again.

Potent hope, rising from within us, is usually animated by energy and faith that come from sources like these:

  •  commitment or confidence in ourselves (“We can do it!”),
  • caring (“Future generations matter so much to me!”),
  • passion and vision (“I just love life and our vision of what’s possible!”),
  • principled non-attachment (“The outcome matters less than the rightness of what we do!”),
  • seeing the perfection or potential in difficulties (“This crisis is an opportunity!”),
  • connecting to the power of predecessors (“Look at what’s been done before!”),
  • shifting to a higher, deeper, longer perspective (“There’s something bigger going on here that we’re part of…!”),
  • the intrinsic joy of doing (“I love what I do, no matter what happens!”),
  • simple choice (“I choose positivity because it gives me an exciting, meaningful life!”) or even
  • grit and determination (“I refuse to give up!”).

All these perspectives provide energy and inspiration that help us remain engaged even in the face of immense disasters or obstacles. It is this kind of hope – this potent active hope – that gives the world its best chances, that sustains life, and that often makes our own lives meaningful and rich as we find ourselves rising to the challenge of our journey over and over.”

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