I will say it plainly, hope is strawberry-flavored poison.
Hope sounds nice. It is a sacred cow, sold as an elixir that makes our problems to magically disappear if we keep hoping.
We are often told that whenever there is a problem or a challenging situation, all we need is to sprinkle some hope upon it and voila! all will be well.
But since we don’t take things for granted. And we are in the habit of questioning everything, we will surgically examine the concept of hope.
To put things into perspective, let’s say you attended a job interview. Realistically, there are two possible outcomes, you get the job or you don’t.
Now, what is the point of hoping for a call from the interviewer. Even if we hope, agonize and anticipate as much as possible, it changes nothing.
If things go our way, it’s either because we created the conditions for them to happen. Or it was by God’s grace or luck or whatever it is.
But surely, things don’t go our way because we hoped they would? Do they?
One may say, are you saying then that we stop hoping and just give up?
Well, first I’m not saying we do anything.
Second, giving up only happens where there is hope. Giving up is the twin sister of hope. If one did not hope in the first place, he would not need to give up.
One may ask, do you want us to be hopeless? Well, hope and hopelessness are two sides of the same coin. One hopes, then when reality does not match his hopes, he becomes hopeless.
So, it is precisely because we hoped that we ended up hopeless.
What works is not hope, but understanding.
If we seek to understand, if we seek to see reality as it is, we would spare ourselves the anxiety and emotional turmoil occasioned by hope.
Hope tastes nice on the tongue, but is poisonous nonetheless.
Fabio