Elusive Hope

Over the last few weeks I have been thinking and talking a lot about the idea of visioning. The process of looking outward to see what is possible for ourselves, friends and family, our community and world. I love the process because you get to throw out all the rules of how it should be to imagine how things could be. The next step is to explore how that could actually come to be. That's the place we often get stuck, in the movement from what we want to what can be. It is also the place of most opportunity because so much is possible. This is not a place for those who are faint of heart; this is a place to muster all the courage and heart you have and move toward your vision.

In my conversations with people I have heard that maybe we have lost hope that things can be different in our world. You only have to watch the news to see that our world is not at peace and people feel the uneasiness in themselves. The security we once felt on all levels is no longer there and spans from job security to the security of our nation. It makes think me that vision is of no use without hope and hope is not possible without seeing things in a new way.

Just recently I was given this excerpt from a publication and it goes like this: " The world is to big for us. Too much is going on, too many crimes, too much violence and excitement. Try as you will, you get behind in the race in spite of yourself. It is an incessant strain to keep pace, and you still lose ground. Science empties its discoveries on you so fast you stagger beneath them in hopeless bewilderment. The political world is news changing so rapidly that you're out of breath trying to keep pace with who's in and who's out. Everything is high pressure. Human nature can't endure much more."

Does this sound familiar? This was actually written in The Atlantic Journal in 1833! I'm guessing that the author felt hopeless in what was happening around him or her. How this is much different than today I'm not sure, but I do know that hope is one of our biggest attributes.

There is a song by Andre Thomas, an African American poet and writer called, I Dream A World. The beginning of the song goes like this, I dream a world where man No other man will scorn, Where love will bless the earth And peace its path adorn" We are in the very process of asking ourselves this very same question, what kind of world do we dream and how can we dream it together? What do we want for ourselves and our world?

I want to leave you with one final thought and it is from Margaret Mead, " Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. " If you could answer the question I dream a world....what do you imagine? We would love to hear from you! ~Blessings~

Sandy