What is too much hope and when should we let hope go?

Hope is a funny thing. We need hope to survive, to give us a drive to move forward, to give us something to look forward to, and to strive toward. But too much hope can create unrealistic expectations and lead us to a more crushing despair when our hopes are left unmet, or worse, crushed away completely under the cold grip of reality. So where is the line between too much hope and not enough? And once you lose hope, do you ever get it back?

What gives us hope? Are hopes and dreams interchangeable, or is one meant to be more reality based? It seems like we get it from a few different places. Firstly ourselves, some of us are born with more optimism, we see the glass half full. We can naturally look from a perspective that shows us the bright side first, or the benefits rather than the focusing on the negatives. I tend to be a person with high levels of optimism, maybe to an annoying degree. Maybe I believe that if I hope and wish for something enough I can make it materialize. But I always believe there is a solution for every problem, a way to solve every puzzle. It was something my dad instilled in me, to always look for a way… because he believed (as I learned to) that there in fact WAS always a way if you wanted something enough. I guess I still believe that, but I am also tired, tired of fighting the battle required for finding the way to reach for those hopes.

I have a mind that is always thinking, never stopping, it has always been this way. I create hope, I create dreams, scenarios in my mind that are worth striving toward, that would make me happy. But I also have priorities, things I won’t sacrifice to reach those hopes, this are the ‘present’ here and now hopes. Being available to my children when they need me, and for important events is one think I would never sacrifice.

Sometimes we are given hope from external sources. Someone tells us something and we trust them, or want to believe them. So we fall into a new hope. Someone says they love you, and you allow your mind to drift into visualizing the future with them. Allowing yourself to visualize the future is hope you create, but it is fueled by someone else’s words or promises. That kind of externally given hope can be dangerous, you are relying on someone else, you are trusting them, and giving them pieces of emotional control.

The worst outcome is when that kind of externally gifted hope breaks your heart. And sometimes this kind of hope can be hardest to let go of, because there are still so many what if’s involved with the other person. You hope even though your logical mind tells you that you shouldn’t, but you can’t always reason with your heart. And hope is partly heart driven.

You hope even though you know you shouldn’t, even though you are telling yourself you are stupid to hope, even trying to actively convince yourself to stop and give up. This is the painful hope, the hope that hurts you, the haunting hope. Then you wonder, even if your hopes came true, at this point could you take him back anyway after all you’ve felt, all the pain this hope has caused you, all the pain the hope he gave has put you through. And you go back to the cycle of, after all of this, why can’t I stop hoping?