Some Thoughts Concerning "Hope"

Sometimes in my life I start to notice a recurring theme. For the last couple of weeks, that theme has been hope. If you ask me, that's a pretty good theme to have for your life. So, basically, I want to write a little bit about what I've learned from hope recently.

In General Conference, President Dieter F. Uchtdorf gave a talk entitled "The Infinite Power of Hope." I remember being really touched by what he had to say, so I'm going to use some quotes from his talk as I go along.

I recently had my heart broken (hence some of the angst in my blog... which I now apologize for, but hey, it makes for good entertainment sometimes, right?), and when I say "recently" I mean about two months ago, after two and a half years of being devoted to someone who turned out to be completely different than I thought they were. I doubt that the break up would have been as hard as it was on me had I not been planning my life around having him around. When we broke up, many of my life plans (or at least what I thought I wanted to be my plans) were ruined and I was left hurting, broken, angry, directionless, and more vulnerable than I have ever felt in my life. This being my third (yes, THIRD) legitimate broken heart, I'm sure it's easy to understand why my heart immediately put up protective walls more resistant than the Great Wall of China and why the rest of me almost completely shut down. I was devoid of almost all hope for my future (especially regarding healthy relationships), except for that part of me that has a testimony of Christ and his Atonement. Having had past experiences that required me to rely completely on the Atonement in order to for my heart to be healed, there is a part of me that will always have faith to be healed (no matter how weak or strong that faith may be at the time), because I know that the Savior has been there with me through EVERY struggle and EVERY heartache, and I know that it is only through him that I am able to be made whole again. But, despite that small portion of faith, the rest of me, though trying SO HARD to be strong, was in a state of despair. President Uchtdorf said, "The adversary uses despair to bind hearts and minds in suffocating darkness. Despair drains from us all that is vibrant and joyful and leaves behind the empty remnants of what life was meant to be. Despair kills ambition, advances sickness, pollutes the soul, and deadens the heart. Despair can seem like a staircase that leads only and forever downward." Truly, the immediate results of my broken heart were a loss of ambition in school, a decrease in trust, a pessimistic attitude, a feeling of complete emptiness, a loss of my sense of self-worth, and a loss of hope for anything better. I suddenly had to rethink my plans for the future, but had no idea how to reorganize them. Many aspects of my life, including school, future work, relationships, schedule of graduation, etc. suddenly needed to take a new direction, with a new focus, and I had no idea how to tackle that task. Such things can make a person feel hopeless quite easily.
Getting back to that small amount of faith that I had in me - The one thing that kept me going through this hard time was faith that the Lord has a specific plan of happiness for me. I tried to remind myself that if that certain guy was not a part of that plan, then someone else better would be. I held on tightly to the knowledge I have that my Heavenly Father loves me unconditionally, and I knew that I had been living my life in such a way that I was worthy to receive blessings, happiness, and healing from him as long as I was willing to be patient and to put my trust in him. Faith and Hope, President Uchtdorf says, both act as one leg in a "three-legged stool" together with charity. "These three stabilize our lives regardless of the rough or uneven surfaces we might encounter at the time." Faith and hope depend greatly on each other, and I'm convinced that it was this small amount of faith that helped me to develop hope in Jesus Christ and hope that things would get better soon. "Hope in our Heavenly Father's merciful plan of happiness leads to peace, mercy, rejoicing, and gladness. The hope of salvation is like a protective helmet; it is the foundation of our faith and an anchor to our souls."
Let me back track a bit and just say that at the time, I had no idea that this was the principle I was holding on to. It wasn't until a month later, after many earnest and tearful prayers, that General Conference came around and I was able to hear President Uchtdorf's talk about hope. That's when hope began to be a common theme in my life - like Heavenly Father was trying to teach me an important lesson. General Conference was also the first day that I started going out with the guy that I am currently dating (unofficially). (Ah ha! you say. This is all starting to make sense now!) President Uchtodorf's talk made me realize that I was lacking in hope. Then, a couple of weeks later, I was having a discussion with guy I am currently dating, and I made a comment to him over lunch that began with the phrase, "Well, if I ever get married..." This was a mistake, because he immediately called me out on it and asked, "Do you really think there's no hope for you?" (Disclaimer: In no way am I upset that I am not married now and in no way to I wish to be married soon. This was all referring to somewhere down the road.) When he asked me that question I realized that my own lack of hope in that one specific area (that stems from many different things, not just one bad break up) was causing me some real pain in my life. I thought about it a lot and I prayed about it a lot, and it all came back to this: The Lord has made me some incredible promises and it is up to me to hope in him that he will make good on those promises. If I have that hope, then there is no reason to fear or be discouraged. "Hope is not knowledge, but rather the abiding trust that the Lord will fulfill His promise to us. It is confidence that if we live according to God's laws and the words of His prophets now, we will receive desired blessings in the future. It is believing and expecting that our prayers will be answered. It is manifest in confidence, optimism, enthusiasm, and patient perseverance."
Before this turns into a novel, I just want to say that now, two months later, it is easy to look back and see how a little bit of hope got me a long way. Faith bread hope and hope lead to more sincere prayers and a greater desire to have my will aligned with God's will. Because of this (and a GREAT DEAL of patience), God sent me ways to cope with and heal from my broken heart (ie: A new boy toy that helped me to see that yes, I CAN do better than last boyfriend and I AM worth it!) and I am now in a much better and happier place because of it. Though I am still learning and still trying to implement this principle in my life, I believe that Hope is one of the lessons that the Lord needed me to take from this trial. So, if anyone who may read this blog (especially if you've actually been reading the WHOLE thing... kudos to you!) is experiencing despair or dark times, I promise you that a hope in Christ and his specific and perfect plan of happiness for YOU as an individual will help you through it. Please know that there is hope, even if it is hard to see sometimes. And, sometimes we have to learn these things the hard way. But, "We learn to cultivate hope the same way we learn to walk, one step at a time." Take comfort in these words, "We hope in Jesus the Christ, in the goodness of God, in the manifestations of the Holy Spirit, in the knowledge that prayers are heard and answered. Because God has been faithful and kept His promises in the past, we can hope with confidence that God will keep His promises to us in the present and in the future. In times of distress, we can hold tightly to the hope that things will 'work together for [our] good.'"