By Steve Gahagen

There is something about a new year that gives us the freedom to dream of new possibilities and hope for a better future, both for ourselves and the world around us. The idea of a clean slate can be very powerful psychologically—it offers an opportunity to leave behind any past disappointments or challenges and approach the upcoming year with renewed optimism. That’s why we celebrate the turning of the calendar, despite not knowing whether calamity or good fortune will meet us on the other side. 

There is immense power in hope. One psychologist said that as long as a an individual has hope, they can recover from anything and everything.

If one could put hope into a pill form and put those pills in prescription bottles, what would be the street value of those pills? Is it possible that addictions are driven by a search for hope and meaning? 

People are tempted to lose hope when they experience overwhelming loss, repeated failures, impossible situations, or when they’re hurt by people they trust. We lose hope when we feel powerless or captive. Loneliness and the lack of life-giving relationships contributes to hopelessness. 

A school system in a large city had a program to help children staying in the hospital keep up with their school work. One day, a teacher who was assigned to the program received a routine call asking her to visit a particular child. She took the child’s name and room number and talked briefly with the their regular class teacher. "We’re studying nouns and adverbs in his class now," the regular teacher said, "and I’d be grateful if you could help him understand them so he doesn’t fall too far behind.”

The hospital program teacher went to see the boy that afternoon. No one had mentioned that the boy had been badly burned and was in great pain. Upset at the sight of the boy, she stammered as she told him, "I’ve been sent by your school to help you with nouns and adverbs." When she left, she felt she hadn’t accomplished much.

But the next day, a nurse asked her, "What did you do to that boy?" The teacher felt she must have done something wrong and began to apologize. "No, no," said the nurse. "You don’t know what I mean. We’ve been worried about that little boy, but ever since yesterday, his whole attitude has changed. He’s fighting back, responding to treatment. It’s as though he’s decided to live.”

Two weeks later, the boy explained that he had completely given up hope until the teacher arrived. Everything changed when he came to a simple realization. He expressed it this way: "They wouldn’t send a teacher to work on nouns and adverbs with a dying boy, would they?”

Questions to Consider:

• What are your hopes for a New Year, whether in your work or relationships? 

• How can you leverage your strengths to make those hopes come to life?

• How can you leverage your strengths to bring hope to the people in your sphere of influence and help them see possibilities in their lives? 

At Play to Your Strengths, we love to ask the question, “What are you looking forward to?” It is always important for us to be looking forward to something.

*Nearly 300 young people each week between the ages of 10-34 are so hopeless that they end their lives before they have hardly begun. We all can make a difference by being attentive and kind to the young people around us.