Blog

On Hope.

HOPE. It’s one of those words we closely attach to Hallmark moments and Praise & Worship. It has always been a “positive” word (if ever there are), usually given the all-too-overstated concept that everything will be fine, or that everything will turn out okay. It is one to push people to the belief that sitting down in passivity will yield a promising eventuality, or that the all-too-powerful notion of positive thinking will change the reality of life from one that is forlorn, to one that is filled with optimism. Few have dared to look at hope for the exact opposite of what it is believed to be – that it can be an agent of despair, and could be one to encourage blind faith.

I was one of those people, probably brought about by my innate compulsion to be cheerful, or it could be that the Libran in me is trying to balance out my mind’s negativity. In any case, I fell victim to hope, and its promise of change.

A little over a year ago, I placed all my bets on Hope, and a whole lot of other clichés that I dare not remember for fear of embarrassing myself. And when I say all bets, I mean everything. It’s as if Hope were as tangible as a bookie that I trusted my emotions to, ready to spend and wager with at any given whim. I “hoped” for the best, even though I already had my own version of what the best was, and I “hoped against hope” that everything will turn out right, even when I knew that there was only one right way — my way.

In the process, I was introduced to other words that seemed more interesting than Hope. Jadedness gave me a new sense of control; a new palette to play around with that I can manipulate, and a fresh perspective on things. Blue gave me calmness and peace, as it always has, and has shown deeper shades of sentiment that I dared not explore before. Release has taken on a new form, and has aligned itself with Growth, to show me a path much clearer than that of Hope’s. Love gave me a new dress, one which fit me better than it fit any other person, and the re-learning of how to wear it in front of myself and in front of others took on an interesting route. Hate also turned into Challenge & Apathy, and gave me new tools to refocus. And amidst all these changes, one thing remained the same: Hope. It still showed me its false promise, its dangerous visions of things that “can be” and the paradise that awaits me simply from waiting for “it” to happen.

And what is “it?” “It” is the attempt to please everyone’s cause. “It” is making you feel “better” without really showing you how. “It” is the sorry conjecture one takes out in lieu of an actual answer. Hope’s promise of change is an oxymoron. It simply does not exist because it works within the framework of the status quo, and is therefore not an agent of change. And what is life but a series of metamorphoses that we all engage in, whether we like it or not. Hope is that chain that keeps us trapped in our cocoons.

I say these as a requiem to what would have been a celebration of life 6 days ago. Thanks to my new-found words and their new-found meanings, it simply passed by like the reality of the seasons, up until the time a friend reminded me what the day represented. And much like the transition from winter to spring, I took that step and owned it, and realized that we didn’t need Hope and it’s promise of change. All that was needed was to embrace Change itself, and everything else will be fine.