Hope as a Verb

HOPE

Is there a difference for you between a wish, a hope or a dream?  I know I sometimes use those words interchangeably in a fanciful way:  I wish I was going on vacation... I hope I am going on vacation... I am dreaming of being on vacation!

But when matters are more serious, or even grave...do I still use these words as if they meant the same thing?  I wish I didn't need surgery... I hope I don't need surgery... I dreamt I did not need surgery?  [I have no surgery planned]  No, I don't use these words in the same way when speaking of something more consequential, more serious.

In a conversation yesterday with sister spiritual directors, one of them related something she'd heard over the weekend and that she was still in the process of unpacking and wondering about.  Her little something also captured my attention so, that it bubbled up first thing this morning.  At a conference from which she's just returned, the speaker offered this seemingly simple thought: "hope without action leads to despair."  Hope without action leads to despair.  How does that feel to you?  Hold that thought.

So this morning I was on a social media site and read one of those posts that come up every so often.  They are the equivalent to a chain letter...that if you don't pass it on...something terrible will happen to you, but if you do, something wonderful will happen.  The post was about a serious matter, cancer.  But somehow the author believed that pasting this chain letter was efficacious.

It was in reading that frivolous post on social media,  that Patricia's wondering came back to me.  And let me state my inkling, or my fear, up front.  My fear is that many people... with a great hope for something good... believe (erroneously) that posting on social media is action; is doing something.  And while being heart-feltly concerned for a friend or family member with cancer...hoping for their survival is a call to action--a social media post is not an action.

The most likely actions for such a hope may be a call to prayer. Or a call to listening to the person's pain.  Maybe it's a call to make a supper, to watch their kids, to hold their hand, to drive them to an appointment.  To not have our true hope(s) become despair... action is needed.  Real action...not false action...fake action.

But we've been duped, en masse, into believing that doing a COPY and PASTE on a social media site is doing something.  Whether its something as serious as health concerns, the working of our politics, or our concern for the welfare of the earth--let me assure you that COPY AND PASTE will not help a person, people or cause.  And it will not hold back despair.  It cannot hold back your despair.

It is not lost on me that I am sitting here with my laptop literally on my lap to share this "aha" moment of mine on another social media outlet.  But  if just one of you who reads this begins to think about those things for which you hope...and actually takes a step toward action (real action) then I'm blessed.  And you will be too.  

Wishes and dreams are magical, friends.  Sometimes, they can even keep a little light burning in a  dark or scary space for a while.  But hope?  Our hopes must have feet on them. Our hopes call us beyond ourselves for our own good and/or the good of others.  And when great hopes are not matched with great action...they can lead to despair.

I did not Copy and Paste the item on my timeline this morning.  But I'm engaged in discovering an action step for those things that rise from wish or dream status in my life to a true hope.  And I've written this little piece, because I hope you will do the same.

In much peace and with love,

Kathleen Bronagh Weller
THECELTICMONK