The turmoil and its psychological implications we are facing in our heavenly abode Kashmir for the last few decades are irreversible. There is no scientific tool by which we can evaluate its quantum nor we can magnify it with any magnifying glass and see its devastation on our mental health. Lagging basic necessities, corruption, constant shutdowns, losses in business, repeated closure of educational institutions, and living life under the shadow of constant fear and anxiety has been accepted by masses as their fate and destiny. Every single person bears scars on their persona and has huge implications on their life. During these decades every individual is struggling harder to minimize the impact and finding ways to overcome and adapt to the situation. Many generations have seen such pain, agony, and deaths that have made them vulnerable to any kind of mental health issues. After constant exposure to such an environment, people found various defense mechanisms to overcome fear, stress, pain, anxiety, and uncertainty. There are thousands of painful stories to share and irreversible damage done to the psyche of people but there is no one to listen and heal them. People learn to ignore and bear every pain silently and accept situations as their destiny or the divine punishment for their sins. Constant day-to-day frustrations are leading to many mental health issues that are indirectly affecting our physical health and unfortunately, our society and our social stigmas stricken to mental health are making it worse. We choose to suffer silently and lose hope. Everything with uncertainty around us makes us lose hope. The truth is Hope seems a hollow word.
What is Hope?
A hope is a feeling of expectation and desire for a particular thing to happen. Hope is an optimistic state of mind that is based on an expectation of positive outcomes with respect to events and circumstances in one’s life or the world at large. In general, having hope is having an expectation that something good will happen in the future or that something bad will not happen. You can think about hope in different ways; you can feel it as an emotion or use it as one way to motivate yourself to action or as part of a coping mechanism, which gets you through loss.
Being hopeful makes you an optimist, which the American Psychological Association defines as someone who “anticipates positive outcomes, whether serendipitously or through perseverance and effort, and who is confident of attaining desired goals.” We all exist somewhere on the spectrum of pessimist to optimist, and very few of us are full on, forever, only glass-half-full people. It is completely normal to have trouble being optimistic, even in the best of circumstances. During the worst times in our lives, it is even more of a challenge. “Basically, we don’t feel so miserable and afraid about the things that we face in life that are inevitably going to come around from time to time,” Hope can be the catalyst to get us to create other behaviors that do make things a little easier.
Here are a few tips for how to be hopeful…
Because there is no happiness without hopefulness. There is no healing without hoping. There is no humanity without hope. We can inculcate hope during our every worst times and here are some valuable tips to inculcate it.
Recognize your fear for what it is.
We all experience fear. However, not everyone recognizes it for what it is. In order to rise above the feeling of being afraid and into a higher energetic frequency like hope, you must identify and name it when it bubbles up within you. Then, instead of acting on that anxious, uncertain state, learn to simply say, “I’m feeling afraid right now, but I know it will pass.” Like any emotional state, fear is only temporary, and it will not last if you learn to watch it instead of wallow in it. The most important thing you can do is not act upon your fear. Any action based in fear will always create more fear. The negativity will trigger the shadow in another and it will bring down the energetic vibration of the entire interaction. Learning to name your fear is the first step to transcending it.
Seek out positivity
It is one thing to stay up to date on what is going on in the world. It is another thing entirely too constantly check social media, read articles and stories about what disturb your peace and follow people who keep you stuck in the low energetic frequency of fear.You are reading this article because you clearly want to lead a life filled with more hope. Now give yourself the permission to reflect this inner intention in your outer world. Follow more accounts focused on empowerment and love. Prioritize news outlets that share feel-good stories. Refrain from sharing negativity online in favor of spreading more positivity yourself.Whatever you seek, you will find. In addition, it will either lift you up or drag you down. You get to decide.
Channel your energy into productive change
There is a distinct difference between actions based in fear and actions based in hope. Fear tells you that you need to protect, preserve and keep things the way they are. In that regard, fear is an energetic resistance to the expansive nature of the Universe. Hope, on the other hand, tells you that better days are ahead if you trust and have patience. Thus, hope is in energetic alignment with the progressive nature of the Universe because it acknowledges the beauty that is possible with change. You can and should put in concerted effort to bring about the change you wish to see in the world. Rather than complain and spread negativity via the Internet, invest your time and energy into making an affirming impact on the world. Hope without action is empty and meaningless in the same way that action based in fear does nothing to elevate humanity or improve our society.
Give what you wish to receive
Oftentimes, you withhold from the world the very things you wish to receive. You do this because you expect to get before you give. However, by not sharing authentically and out of the beauty of your own heart, you dishonor your loving essence and do an injustice to your hopeful nature. Instead of keeping, your love locked away only for those people who give you what you think you want and need, give out of the pure nature of your being. If you want to see more positivity in the world, share more positivity from your day. If you want to hear the words “I love you” more often, start speaking them into existence more often to the people you care about. If you want to build connections instead of burning bridges, talk about why you are scared and watch as other people say, “You know what? I’m scared, too.” Hope and love attract more hope and love.
Practice, Practice and Practice
Whether it is through meditation, daily affirmations, prayer, a gratitude journal, mindfulness or other exercises, the more you practice training your mind to focus on the good, the more it will find it by default over time. You can make progress toward being more positive. You can help reset your mind to hope instead of fear. You can live a life that is more optimistic than pessimistic. However, it will not happen on its own. You must recondition your brain to believe in the moral decency of others and that will take time and effort. It all starts with you.
“Hope is a good thing, may be the best of things, and no good thing every dies.”
Dr. Thseen Nazir is Asst. Prof., Dept. of Counseling and Guidance, Ibn Haldun University Başakşehir, Istanbul, Turkey