(Photo by Michael Yee)


"Hope" is the thing with feathers –
That perches in the soul –
And sings the tune without the words –
And never stops – at all –

And sweetest – in the Gale – is heard –
And sore must be the storm –
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm –

I've heard it in the chillest land –
And on the strangest Sea –
Yet, never, in Extremity,
It asked a crumb – of Me.

- By Emily Dickinson

You could be happy.

The possibility of it is enough for us to feed on for the rest of our days and keep us busy.

"True hope dwells on the possible, even when life seems to be a plot written by someone who wants to see how much adversity we can overcome. True hope responds to the real world, to real life; it is an active effort."

-The Confidence Course: Sevens Steps to Self-Fulfillment by Walter Anderson

I am irked when people say things like, "He/she should have done this in this way not that way..." or "As a teacher/friend/student, he/she should have been..." Why all the "should"s? I think they've forgotten that we are all human. We make mistakes. We don't live up to expectations. We lose it, just because, and we fall. There is what you should be and what you could be. But there is also what you are. Things go wrong all the time. People screw up all the time. What's the point in criticizing or complaining or blaming anybody? The only person who has the right to do this is the one who is perfect in every way. Do you dare claim such a title?

You know what we should have? We should have faith, we should have love, we should have kindness, we should have forgiveness, we should have patience, we should have trust, we should have acceptance... I could ramble on and sound so bimbotically idealistic in some beauty pageant, but really, there's so many so many other things that we should have, rather than to cling on to rigid rules and inflexible mentalities. Why is it so easy to find faults in others but not find beauty in them?

We should all have a little hope. :) Life would be unbearable without it. To have that little voice inside that whispers in gold, "It is possible. Don't give up. Stay strong. Push on. Move on. Try. And try again. And try again. And try again."

Hope is the very reason why we're still alive today.

Unless of course you have never really lived at all, only pretended to as you breathed in and out.