My Opinion on Hope

Could false hope be better than none? Or could false hope be worse than despair? What thin line exists between the so-called false hope and true hope?

I had arrived at these questions following a chain of thoughts from last week’s opinion on whether or not to have children. By the way, the opinions column, though a new addition, has been nothing short of spectacular. It’s really a cool thing to hear from different voices and opinions, extremes and middlers likewise. Only I hope you, dear Reader, would let us hear from you more often in our comment sections.

Back to last week. Theweirdprodigy had brought our attention to how our ideal perfect choices are just as true as believing your two legs could thrust you faster than light. There really is no choice with its happily ever after; every option comes with its downsides. My mentor would say, “there is no best choice, only better and easier options, and the better one isn’t always the easier one.” So whichever option you go for, you should reach that desired Canaan, one day, hopefully.

Huh, I shouldn’t bring up the hope word just yet.

Now, the previous text had ended with these words:

“After all, it is never the darkness that consumes us but the false hope that everything is going to be alright with whatever choice we make.”

For every moment I’ve gone back to read this wonderful eye-opener, I’ve found this question coming up: “Is expecting everything will be alright really a bad thing?”

Even though I strongly believe this ending statement to be true, there seems to be a missing part that keeps disturbing me. I’ve discussed this topic of expectancy with quite a lot of people and I’ve heard them talk about their ways of tackling different situations. Some had stated that when faced with a situation where they have assumed themselves less likely to achieve goodness (in whatever form it may be), they’d rather not hope they can achieve it. If they do attain that prize, they’d prefer to feel surprised than to hope and only meet the disappointments of failure.

However, when do you think we are most likely to climb this height before us? When we hope or when we do not — tell me. I mean, when do you think we are most likely to get good grades? When we think we can, or when we think we can’t? How does your hope or no hope affect your preparation? And when failure does show up, is it in any way a cue to throw in the towel? Or perhaps, we shouldn’t go down that lane. But yeah, indeed, the darkness is ever-existent, always trying to seem overwhelming. Still, when are we most likely to find the little lights in the dark?

In my opinion, I do not believe the darkness, nor the hope — be it false or true — that consumes us, but the complete absence of hope, which is despair, that brings us to our end.

The darkness will always be there to stand against us, whatever goal we want to achieve, whatever step we wish to take. It can sometimes be so daunting that we think it can consume us. Still, until the time comes when darkness can consume us, whenever we ride through the dark, we only grow stronger.

To ride through the dark, we must find a reason. That reason is the point of my text. By thinking, expecting there just might be lights around the corner, we find reason enough to rough it through the dark. Now, this can be in two forms — the false or the true hope. I believe the distinction between the two lies in the fact that false hope finds its foundation in a wave of denial. By choosing not to see what lies before you is a rocky, dark road, assuming it to be a plain one, you walk on blindly until you slip and fall, which can be very painful. On the other hand, true hope is knowing full well just how rocky the road ahead of you is, yet choosing to navigate through with a belief that there might just be a well lit, plain road up ahead.

Either one you choose to walk with, one thing is constant to both — there is a reason to keep moving forward through the dark. Well, except in false hope, where the fall might be the end. But despair, oh despair, is really just the end. By not expecting that the darkness would ever yield to light, what reason would then exist to navigate through the dark? Why not just eat and drink in the dark, and when tomorrow comes, let’s end it! Sad world!

So yeah, I believe it is okay to hope that everything will turn out fine, even when everything appears to be unwell. It was also this same belief of mine that led me to write on how hope affects our health in a two-post series (Stress & Hope). But hey there, Reader! What do you think? Would you rather be surprised, disappointed, or have you found a middle ground to all these? Let’s have it all in our comment section.

Thank you!