With Hope in Mind

Life is hard. Life can stink. Life is not fair. But there is a way to get through with some semblance of peace and happiness. How is that? It's all in your mindset. Life is not controllable. Circumstances happen that completely and utterly take you off course, like the winds of a raging hurricane. You are tossed and battered, bruised and burdened, confused and conflicted. But in the midst of chaos there is one thing that can be controlled. Your mind. What you think will be what you do. Will you quit or will you hope?

There are four types of mindsets that I have observed in people. The Optimist, the Pessimist, the Regretter, and the Planner. These are ways that people try to control their situations. While we all fall into these categories, the extent to which one identifies with a category affects their resilience and ability to hope.

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An Optimist tends to see the good in everything. They look for bright side, they don't like to dwell on negative things whether it be news, movies, situations, and/or people. They prefer to see the world through rose colored glasses. They prefer to think of only things that are pleasing. In fact, if you are a Christian or you have Christian friends, they would say that we should take Paul's advice in Philippians 4:8, which says, “Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things.” And that is good advice, who wouldn't want to think about great things all the time?

While I think being an optimist is an admirable way to live, I think we can agree it isn't always easy or practical to our highly distractable minds. The negative elements are all around. And if truth be told, more often than not, a true optimist will try to insulate themselves from the negative by building barriers, so that they can avoid the messiness that full engagement often entails. But, no matter how much one sinks their head in the sand, only thinking of good, avoiding the bad, the bad still happens to them and many times they are not prepared to deal with it. They feel blind-sided and let down or worse of all, miss out on meaningful relationships with people that may not fit their optimistic view or notion of worthiness. Being and optimist does not give immunity to trouble.

Then there is the Pessimist. The Eeyore of the crowd. The one who never gets their hopes up or sees

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the good, the one that expects disappointment, not fully grasping that they are becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you look for the negative you will surely find it. It's easy to be disappointed because we live in an imperfect and sinful world. It's easy to have your feelings hurt because people make off-handed remarks. It is easy to be a victim, and it is easy to give up. Again, if truth be told, more often than not, a true pessimist will try to insulate themselves by building barriers, as well, never fully engaging in the people or experiences around them. The pessimist will never find their way to happiness, because they haven't prepared their mind for anything else but failure and their default is to quit.

But there is a third way to be. A hybrid of both and that is the way I prefer live. It has taken me many years and many trials to get to this point. I would call myself a hopeful realist...one who appears to an optimist as a pessimist, to a pessimist as an optimist. WHAT? That sounds like crazy talk. Let me explain. I tend to look at things with the view that it most probably won't work out as I had planned, there may be some form of failure, and I may get disappointed. But when those things happen, that aren't how I had imagined, my mind is prepared and I can react from there. I am not shocked or upset because I figured it may occur and so I go on. I may have to go in a new direction for a bit or try a different tactic, but I don't give up. One of my favorite proverbs...Proverbs 16:9 says, "A man's heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps." When I change my mind set to believe that, I find that most times something better than what I thought could happen or better than I could've planned happens. It is the renewing of my mind, as Paul says in Romans 12:2, "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will." The renewing of the mind becomes the optimism that allows me to assess and move on, to not quit, to get through the terrible times.

It is never easy and it can be painful, but the optimism I'm speaking of is really none other than Hope. And hope is a wonderful thing! It is all the cliches'... the sun peaking through the clouds...the light at the end of the tunnel. You can never be confined to sadness, failure, loneliness, if you have Hope and Hope is what sets us free in the end. 

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A person can spend most of the time looking in the rearview mirror of their life...the Regretter. Being filled with regret for all the coulda, woulda, shoulda's. Like the saying goes, "Hindsight is 20/20". It's easy to beat yourself up for the decisions you made with the information you had at the time, but in hindsight may have not been the best. However, all that is really accomplished is that you have missed the here and now, and it is a vicious cycle, because now they have more regret for the things they continue to miss.

A person can spend most of their time looking to the future making their plans...the Planner. People try to account for all the things they think may happen and how to attain their goal down the road. It is their way to try and control the chaos and while planning is good, plans tend to become highly inflexible. The plan becomes the master of the planner instead of a means to an end. All the while, no one knows what will happen in even the next hour, so then it would seem that planning is futile. And while they are making all these plans and trying to make things happen, they miss the here and now and it too becomes a vicious cycle, because they are making concrete plans on the sinking sand of the unknown.

But there is another mindset and that is the one filled with hope. That person can have a plan, live in the moment. Roll with the day and let its surprises bloom like the bright golden petals of the

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sunflower. Sometimes, things come up that seem bad at first, but actually allow you more meaningful experiences than anything you could have ever planned yourself. None of us are guaranteed the next hour, the next day, the next year. But we spend so much time looking at our calendars, confined to our infinite little plans that we miss relationships and experiences that are here and now. What if we learned to trust our gut? What if we learned to listen to the small voice inside that offers guidance, but is rarely heard above all the external noise? Jesus, in Matthew 6:25, 27, 33-34 and asks powerful questions while offering great advice on this when He says, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?....Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?....But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.

Now with all my talk of living in the here and now, am I saying to be irresponsible and do what you want? No, plans are good, regrets have merit, but it's how much flexibility that you allow with those things that will give you the freedom, the hope, and the ability to not fear failure, to enjoy the good surprises that occur in the day to day. I guess all I'm trying to say is renew your mind, change your mindset, be flexible and try living in the moment, that is what we are guaranteed, so live each moment like it's your last. Notice what and who is around you and fully appreciate them. Don't let the fear of failure, past or present, hold you back. Live with hope, for hope covers the past and paves the future, and hope begins now. 

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