Nurture Tenacious Hope
- charlotteshristi
- Oct 10
- 2 min read
This morning a surprising sight.... a rainbow unlike any I've ever seen in my 47 years on earth! It got me thinking about hope. It was not a bow in the sky following a shower OR a sundog, but something else. When I searched for the photo I took of it, one I took of Wilkweed seemed to be its collaborator in the story of hope tickling the edges of my mind.
You might be familiar with "Hope for the Flowers" an allegorical illustrated short story by Trina Paulus. I've been participating in the endangered Monarch Butterfly's struggle for survival for the last 10 or so years. I've done this by encouraging their main food source, Milkweed to spread, re-wilding our cow pasture back into woodland and meadow. I regularly grab a handful of milkweed seeds this time of year and help spread them to new locations. When my kids were younger, we hunted Monarch caterpillars and kept them in jars outside through the chrysalis stage to be released as butterflies in the fall. How to below*
It seems to me hope requires inspiration, like I received this morning connecting with the natural world in the form of this rainbow-sun-wolf. AND hope is sustained through our active engagement and persistent nurture, like tending a meadow and a tiny seed that becomes a plant that is an essential part of the ecosystem. Each one of us is also a necessary part of our ecosystem and we each have an important, active role to play in our community and larger world.
In the story "Hope for the Flowers" two caterpillars struggle and finally succeed in discovering their true role as creatures capable of connection and love, transformation and even flight, finally following their instinct to metamorphize into butterflies.
According to John Parsi, executive director of the Hope Center:
“Hope is an active process. Dreams and optimism are just belief structures,” he explained. “When you’re an optimistic person, you believe things in the world will turn out just fine, no matter what happens.”
Parsi says that because optimism doesn’t require a person to do anything, it can be a form of toxic positivity. But from the working scientific definition of hope, hope can only do good for a person.
“Hopeful people cannot just wish things into existence,” he said. “Hope requires a person to take responsibility for their wants and desires and take action in working towards them. Optimistic people see the glass as half full, but hopeful people ask how they can fill the glass full.” **
My wish today is that we each make time to seek inspiration and then do the hard work to BE the change we want to see in the world. May we nurture ourselves, the seed or the caterpillar, that can transform into something wonderous beyond our imagination. May we sustain hope, through the seasons and challenges of life, even though difficult times. May we understand ourselves as valuable, essential participants within a whole vibrant community: our ecosystem that needs us to nurture tenacious hope!
Thank you, Charlotte, for this thoughtful post. I am finding that having hope helps heal grief and encourages me to continue to BE in the world. Herb