Best of the Bad

Being able to limit hope without becoming hopeless is a tricky but essential balancing act.

Imagine you’re locked in a cage. You have to escape. You start brainstorming, but all your ideas involve objects or people you can only find outside the cage. “If only I could get my power tools, I’d be out of here in no time!” Pal, if you could get your power tools, you’d be outside the cage.

So you have to write that stuff off. But that doesn’t mean that you have to give up hope. It just means you have to confine it. You have to create positive thought, but not let it go where you can’t. It’s a nice dream, having those power tools. But it’s an unhelpful dream.

Sometimes your situation is bad. And dreaming about all the ways you could make your situation better if only your situation wasn’t bad to begin with is… well, it’s not very productive.

If you never escape that cage for the rest of your life, there will still be a side of the cage that’s less drafty. A more comfortable corner. An angle from which you can see the sunrise. Whatever it is, find it. Hope for it, even. Dream of a better here and now – and not a pleasant there and then that doesn’t help you get there.