Hope is on my horizon. I feel it in my bones, I sense it in my being, I know it to be part of who I am. I will never give up hope. Hope for a better world, a better life, a better me. Hope is that feeling that led exploreers to cross dangerous oceans in search of a new world. Hope is what keeps people who are imprisoned from giving up. Hope is what allows those who have all they hold dear taken from them to begin again. Hope is natural. It is a gift that I will allow myself to have.

  Hope is important because it can make the present moment less difficult to bear. If we believe that tomorrow will be better, we can bear a hardship today.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Optimism

Today I take optimism seriously. I recognize the power of my thoughts to impact my body, my life and my relationships. When I think positive thoughts, I elevate my immune system. Optimism helps me to live longer. I attract other positive thinkers into my life when I am optimistic and those who dwell on the negative tend to fall away. I draw experiences to myself that help to move my life toward where I want it to be and shape my day in ways that feel good when I take responsibility for what’s going through my own mind.

I am responsible for what I think

Optimists, according to research, tend to do better in coping with life’s stresses than pessimists. They are more likely to use problem-solving strategies to tackle difficulties as they arise, to put a positive spin on stressors, and to look for ways to make the best of a bad situation. Optimism has also been linked with longevity. In a thirty-year study published in Mayo Clinic, it was found that those classified as pessimists had a 19 percent higher risk of mortality than those who were optimists. Seeing the glass as half full, it turns out, might just  be creating a glass that is half full.

From Emotional Sobriety by Tian Dayton PhD

On its own page

…….To be creative, to produce what you will, the mind must be at peace, the heart full. If you want to write, to have great thoughts, to enquire into truth, conflict must cease; but in our civilization, escapes have become much more significant than the understanding of conflict. Modern things help us to escape, and to escape is to be utterly uncreative, it is self-projection. That does not solve our problem. What does solve our problem is to cease to escape and to live with suffering; because, after all, to understand something, one must give full attention to it, and distractions are mere escapes. To understand escapes, which is to put an end to them by seeing their falseness, and to perceive the whole significance of suffering, is a process of self-knowledge; and without self-knowledge……….there is no basis for thought. You can repeat like a gramophone, but you will not be the music-maker, there will be no song in your heart. ……So, through self-knowledge alone can suffering come to an end.

Jiddu Krishnamurti