When fear and doubt rage overhead, hope is the sunlight bursting though.
It’s a big theme in most of my writing but especially in the Above & Beyond Series. It’s sometimes only when you consider what happens in it’s absence that you appreciate how powerful it is.
If Aeron hadn’t hoped she could help in The Empath, if she’d accepted defeat and been sucked in by her fears and doubts then she’d have most certainly been on her way back to Serenity for good! If she didn’t hope she could help in Blind Trust, where would that have left Renee?
In Untrained Eye that glimmer of light will be something I explore once again. There are different sides to hope just as there are to faith.
Hope for a dream – a certain Renee Black has been nursing hopes. A hope that has seen her through tough times, made her reassess the way she saw things, it’s healed her and helped her and forced her to open herself up. It’s so far gotten her to realise that she is worthwhile, that she can make a difference and that she is dearly loved.
Hoping to make a difference- We get to see some of this in action throughout the series. But quite often day-to-day we forget that we can do the same. With the briefest of smiles, dropping in on someone who might need you, sticking your loose change in the charity box, they are all things that we do without realising… and they make a difference too. Opening a door for someone, letting them out of a junction (if you’re a driver) helping them with shopping or directions… or even the offer that is politely turned down, you’re making a difference to someone’s day. These are things that show we’re delaying our busy day, our progress from A to B to give someone a boost. That touch of light, you may never see the power of– most of the time we don’t–but that’s not the point. We don’t do it to please ourselves, we do it because we can, we want to and we hope it’ll make a difference.
Hoping for better – whether you are a single parent working two jobs and going to nightschool to give your children the things they need, a disabled person hoping that someone (anyone) in the planning departments might one day realise you don’t want assault courses, you just want access, or someone suffering from a condition that hopes there will one day be a cure.
Aeron, Renee and Frei go though this kind of hope a lot. They work without recognition in dangerous, taxing and lonely places. It has battered and beaten them up often but they still work to make a difference. They want to make things better. A lot of professions do the same. There are people who have suffered that want to find a way to ease or cure the hurt of others in the same or similar situations.
Suffering can have that effect on us. When we hope, hurt for us can transform into healing others. We may not truly fix our scars but we ensure other people know they aren’t alone. It’s often those who have acute suffering that make the biggest differences because hope ignites something special within them.
The wonder of a human heart is that it seeks to mend others even when it is broken.
Hope – An antidote to fear and doubt.
Hope – A fuel to reach for your dreams
Hope – A determination to help others even when suffering yourself.
Hope – It’s a lovely, uplifting word which sits nicely next to faith. Together they are a bit of a dream team, aren’t they? Hope ignites faith and faith feeds hope.
So I hope you have a lovely day and a wonderful week.
I hope you smile and laugh often.
And… I hope you’re looking forward to Untrained Eye!
Big smiles!
