Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring those ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.
Senator Robert F. Kennedy
Welcome to Ruthlessly Hopeful
I want to create a kinder and more hope-filled world, and I hope you do, too. Ruthlessly Hopeful is here to inform, inspire and motivate you to be more hopeful and do good.
We are a community dedicated to increasing our individual and collective sense of hope and nurturing the hope of others. Along the way, we are trying to do good while spreading hope.
So What is Hope?
Hope is the belief that the future will be better than the present, and I have the power to make it so.
According to research, hope is a way of thinking and not a feeling. That is good news, because it means we can all learn to be more hopeful.
Also, hope gives us purpose and contributes to our well being.
Keep scrolling to learn more.
Latest Posts
Hope consists of:
Desirable goals
Pathways to those goals
Willpower to achieve those goals.
The absence of any one of these will diminish our sense of hope.
Hope requires:
Self-efficacy which is the belief that you can achieve goals you set for yourself.
Agency which is the ability to choose what actions to take and feel like you have some control over your life.
Hope runs on imagination. As one researcher put it, if we can’t imagine it, we have no chance of achieving it.
Most importantly, hope requires action, otherwise it’s just wishful thinking.
If “Plan A” doesn’t work, the alphabet has 25 more letters - 204 if you’re in Japan.
Claire Cook
Research shows……
Hopeful people are more productive and experience better health.
Hopeful students earn at least one letter grade better than their less hopeful peers.
Hope is measurable and people can learn how to hope.
Hope is not a solo sport. Dr. Chan Hellman, a leading hope researcher, calls it a “social gift” because hope is nurtured through our connectedness to others.
Hope is one of the things that makes us human, because no other living creature can hope as humans do.
Hope is contagious. You can actually be more hopeful by spending time with hopeful people. So let’s spread it around!
An interview with Gary Cunningham, a senior advisor at the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy about Baby Bonds and the hope they give for a better future.