What hope isn’t

The etymology of words is very interesting. Thanks to the very helpful blog ‘Words, Words Words’ for this helpful information:

The word hope is of unknown origin. It is possibly a general North Sea Germanic word coming from either the words hopen or hoffen (“to hope”) borrowed from Low German. The word hope also has a possible connection to the word “hop” with the correlation being that of “leaping in expectation”.

I love the idea of leaping and hopping into hope. I hope you are all doing okay and feeling hopeful. I thought it might be helpful to look at the things I do not consider as ‘hope’, as sometimes it is easier to define something by what it isn’t rather than what it is.

So here goes

Hope is not

1 Selfish

2 Unkind

3 hurtful

4 resentful

5 Vicious

6 Violent

7 Abusive

8 Impatient

9 Pessimistic

10 Doubtful

And that’s enough to be getting on with. I think we can learn from this exercise, so today’s recipe of hope is to consider your character and think about aspects that may not be so helpful in your pursuit of hope. I am prone to rumination and so am trying to avoid doing that because it leads to negative speculation and I don’t get anywhere. Sometimes challenging our thought processes is the best way to make progress in making life more hopeful and positive.

I wish you a very hopeful week X

References

https://apecewamogo.wordpress.com/2012/10/12/etymology-of-hope/?unapproved=7416&moderation-hash=b2cb6153381e6164d5035d4b9e442dbc#comment-7416

(accessed 29/06/2020)