Hope alone is an emotion that makes your heart soar when you think of the potentials that could lie ahead. Hope is having faith that the future can be brighter. Hope is having the imagination of how things could change for the better. Hope is something that keeps you hanging on when life provides challenges. Therefore, hope requires action.

Having the insight to imagine how things can be different, in a better way, is positively using your wonderful imagination. However, things don’t change without action. You can’t win the lottery without having a ticket, regardless of how much you hope you have. You can’t contribute to making the world a better place without focussing on what you can do, big or small, to help that happen.

Hope and faith are similar, but also very different. Hope is having a vision about how things can change. Faith is having confidence, plus trust, that all turns out well in the end, in spite of tests and difficulties along the way.

When practising hope, you practice trust, in yourself, in a concept, in another person, in a purpose. You have confidence in something or someone. You practice commitment and if necessary responsibility and purposefulness in taking action to move forward towards your goal. You discover who you are and what you stand for along the way. You find your sense of personal integrity. We’re all different, and we all have difficult values, and that’s what makes the world go round.

Living in the present is what it takes to balance hope. When you hope for something to happen, you are thinking about the future and imagining the potential that lies ahead. What is needed is to bring in the here and now, and take the necessary steps towards making whatever it is you hope for, to happen.

Historically, amazing things have been created because of the thoughts in someone’s mind and the hope that things could be different. Take action, now, and bit by bit, step by step, day by day, your wishes could become a reality too! However, remember that everyone does things in their own time and allow your thoughts and judgments about yourself and others – be kind, be kind, be kind!