#6 Embrace Hope and Desire

In order to keep learning and growing, you have to have the hope and desire for something good to come into your future.

I often see people who have given up. They do not see a better future and they do not have the desire or the will to do the work to improve things. Those, of course, are some of the main symptoms in depression: hopelessness and lack of motivation.

Today, I am talking to you about hope and desire. What do those words mean?

Hope is an expectation or even a dream that something good could happen.

Desire is a strong feeling of wanting to have something or wishing for something to happen.

Hope and desire together are fuel for motivation. You take action in the belief that it could lead to something desirable.

Here is the thing, positive people have hope.

I never thought of myself as a positive person. I thought I was negative, doubting, even cynical. I definitely was at the least very realistic and practical.

One day, I realized that I went through college and grad school because of my hope that it would lead to a career that I would like and that could support me. There were no guarantees and I invested a lot of hard work, stress, and money! I worked hard and stuck with it. I would not have done all of that without hope and desire and a belief that it could be.

Have you ever heard a coach say that they look for an athlete with heart and desire? That is the one who will put their everything into winning.

You can develop hope and desire.

The way to develop hope and desire is to allow yourself to dream.

While I was growing up, my family didn’t have much money. Money was tight enough that I learned to not want anything because I couldn’t have it anyway.

Well, not wanting means you are not dreaming. If you are not dreaming, what reason would you have to try? You need to dream to develop a vision and then work toward making it happen.

As an exercise in developing hope and desire, practice daydreaming as if there were no limits. And then go beyond that and dream up the ideal. From that process you start to know and identify your actual wants. You start to change your belief system to allow for hope and desire. Then, you start taking steps to learn and do what it takes to reach the goal.

There is a saying: A dream written down becomes a goal. A goal broken down into steps becomes a plan. And a plan backed by action becomes reality.

Everyone can have hope and desire. It is not something you are born with or not. You can nurture it and develop it.

This will encourage you to continue to learn and to grow which makes life much more interesting and enjoyable.

Value hope and desire as foundations for experiencing living fully.

It does mean that you need to value hope and desire as important. These concepts need to not be dismissed as silly, frivolous, or a waste of time. They are what help a person to feel alive.

Philosophically, living is not just breathing and having a heartbeat. People do have a tendency to develop a routine and find themselves doing the same things over and over. Feeling alive involves leaving the comfort zone of routine and learning and trying new things. Hope and desire are the fuel which motivates learning and growth. So hope and desire are a part of fulling living.

Hope and desire are about wanting and expecting something good. If you are lacking hope and desire, you can develop and nurture those traits.

You do have to see the value in hoping or dreaming.

Then, allow yourself to daydream without restrictions. Let the ideas flow. Give yourself permission. Go so far as to think of the ideal. This will be particular to you and what you want.

Once you can envision it, you can begin taking steps to learn about and do what it takes to make the idea a reality.

This week, give yourself 15-30 minutes to first settle and relax with some slow, deep breathing. Then, allow yourself to daydream about what a perfect day is for you. What would you be doing? What people or pets would be around? What are the background sounds? How does your body feel? What is your mood? Take the time to play with these ideas. See if your energy and motivation increase. Notice if you change your beliefs.

Listen to this podcast episode here.

For more helpful info, check out my website at ldonreed.com and my Facebook page is also @ldonreed.

Until next time, keep learning and growing.