I previously wrote a message about hope being an illusion, and it got some rather polarized reactions. Some people enjoyed it, while others felt very threatened by it. It seems this is something that needs to be discussed further, as I feel it's a subject that people haven't fully looked at. Our society teaches that hope is a "good thing" and many people have just accepted this without really looking deeper.
Now a person with an emotional attachment to hope isn't going to see what I'm saying here very clearly. As with other attachments, when it is threatened, the being usually goes into defense mode and is more concerned with protecting the attachment than letting it go or really looking at why it's there. If a person didn't defend their attachments, they wouldn't be there in the first place.
What is hope really? Am I incorrect in saying it's simply a desire for a better future? Is that not all that hope is, a desire? Hope is simply a desire dressed up in fancy clothing, and made to seem bigger or more important than other desires. As many Masters have said before, all desire is illusion and desire is the root of suffering. Most people desire a "better world", so why aren't we there yet? The problem with desires is that they only manifest the experience of desiring. When you say "I desire this", you get exactly what you stated, a desire for something. It doesn't give you the object of your desire, only the experience of desiring that thing. Desire is the slow and difficult way to manifestation.
The problems with hope are quite easy to demonstrate, take the predictions we often see from channelers. People are given a date when some incredible event is supposed to occur, and they put enormous amounts of hope into something happening on that date. Then, as has happened many times before, that date comes around and the prediction doesn't come true. What happens to all that hope? For many it turns into disappointment or despair, and for a few it turns into anger as well.
A Higher Truth cannot be false, yet people frequently have hopes that don't come true. If hopes are so often false, what does that say about hope? If holding on to a hope can easily lead to disappointment, what does that say about hope? These questions are essential to learning the basic nature of hope. How can something that's supposed to be so "positive" easily turn into something "negative"? Such is the nature of a dualistic thought, that type of limited thinking is not what Humanity needs more of.
A truth that disturbs people is better than a lie that comforts, though many still practice this the other way around. The truths that people don't want to hear are usually the ones they need to hear the most. It's simply the nature of being stuck in an illusion, it's a disease where people resist the cure. If they were willing to accept the cure, the disease would be gone.
Keeping with the metaphor of illusion as a disease, where does hope fit in? Hope is the pill that helps to ease the symptoms. It helps people to distract themselves from their current suffering by focusing upon the "future". Yet hope is not the cure for the disease, it simply helps to make the disease more tolerable. People do themselves a disservice by thinking hope is supposed to cure them. Then they become dependent upon hope, and learn to live with the disease instead of learning how to cure it.
You either dissolve your illusions in This Moment, or not at all, tomorrow isn't going to fix your problems. Seeing as how tomorrow doesn't even exist in the first place, putting your energy there is simply wasting it on illusion. Hope is always tied into the illusion of a "past/future". The future is supposed to bring healing to all the unhappiness from the past, yet the past is not healed through the future. The past is not healed through waiting or procrastination, it's healed by letting go of the past, and that healing only occurs in the Present Moment of Now.
Jack wants a better life, so he hopes for a better life. Sally wants a better life, so she works hard to create that better life. Who do you think is going to get there first?
When discussing hope with others, I noticed the topic of hell kept coming up. Now when I mention hell, I'm not talking about a place, hell is a state of mind. It's simply the natural result of believing in the illusion that you are separate from God. If you're not Conscious of Your Connection to Source, all sorts of suffering is possible. I've been told people in hell and suffering have nothing but hope, which is very interesting. Why is hope so popular in hell? If it's the cure, as so many believe, why are all these hopeful people still stuck in hell? If you ask a person in hell to tell you the way out of hell, they're going to say, "Hope". The people in hell don't know the way out of hell, if they did, they'd leave.
And no offense, but maybe the Universe knows a little more than you do? Maybe you don't need to tell it what to do? Maybe all your wants, needs, hopes, and desires that never seem to come true are actual holding you back from your true creative potential? I see no problem with making requests, or having preferences about what you'd like, but you have to leave things open for anything to happen. The Universe doesn't just give you what you want, as most people should have learned by now. You have to work with the Universe, and you don't control the Universe, You Are The Universe.
For some, this will be a message of hopelessness, which further demonstrates the dualistic nature of hope. I mentioned previously that hope is always connected to despair, and that one leads to the other. Many believe that without hope, there must be despair, and that a Human Being has no choice but to drift between these two extremes. There is a Middle Path though, and you need neither hope nor despair. Your happiness doesn't have to depend upon a future you have no control over.
For those that may perceive this message as "negative", I can assure you it's not. If you get nothing else from this message, take only this part: Do not put your energy into a better "future", invest it in creating a better Now. For those who want to view things from a negative/positive duality, my message is very positive. I'm telling you that you don't have to wait for Joy to come in the future, that you can begin creating that Joy Now.
Blessings,
Will & The Galactic Free Press
I, Will, the author of this piece, release it into Public Domain. You are free to share it, and even modify it, without any conditions.
Questioner: Of what significance is hope and faith to living?
Krishnamurti: I hope you won't think me harsh if I say there is no significance at all. We have had hope; we have had faith - faith in church, faith in politics, faith in leaders, faith in gurus, because we have wanted to achieve a state of bliss, of happiness. and so on. And hope has nourished this faith. And when one observes through history, through our life, all that hope and faith have no meaning at all, because what is important is what we are; actually what we are - not what we think we are, or what we think we should be, but actually what is. If we know how to look at what is, that will bring about a tremendous transformation.
Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh: Hope is not the friend, remember; it is the foe. It is because of hope that you go on postponing. But you will remain the same tomorrow also, and tomorrow also you will hope for some future. And this way it can go on for eternity, and you can go on missing. Stop postponing. And who knows what the future is going to reveal to you? There is no way to know about it. It is an opening; all alternatives are open. What is really going to happen, nobody can predict. People have tried.
Comments
Please stop giving people
Please stop giving people hope. Just trust that all is occuring as it should. Spare me the hope that something is going to change Aug 4. everthing has changed but others fail to see the change. We are ascending and it does not matter if disclosure happen right this minute or tomorrow. People be the one and only, spirit of one. I am living in the now and disclosure happen to me in my meditation. I saw an alien, when I say alien something that is not familiar to being of this earth. Why do I need discloure.
the differences of hope and faith
Hope is a wanting of somthing. Faith is a knowing of somthing. You cant force things to work. You just have to know that they are working.
Hope & dispair, perhaps known
Hope & dispair, perhaps known otherwise as the wheel of karma?
If so I exit here.
Well Done
Bravo!
If we were completely living in the "Now", "hope" wouldn't even be part of our vocabulary. There would be no use for it...
Thanks for this great piece.
~Love and Light~
Hope is an illusion, however
Hope is an illusion, however it is often a rather useful one. There has always been a lot of desperate people striving simply for survival in this world. Why not go and tell them stop having the desire for a better future and just dwell at the NOW moment instead...
Thinking about "hope"
Very interesting thoughts on "hope".
I just had a flash re "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here" ... Dante's imagined inscription over the entrance to hell. We've always assumed, been taught, the statement was the equivalent of "no way out of this place of eternal suffering", and I assume it's what Dante was thinking (am no scholar on Dante). But maybe we need to look at the statement as a clue to remedy - as in "hope is not what you need to restore your prospects"!
That was a 'flash thought', and not what I meant to post. I meant to thank you for a discussion on what we mean by 'hope' and how we frequently use hope to avoid more effective response to problematic situations that might be improved. I do not argue that some situations cannot be remedied, at least not easily, and acceptance is part of any remedy.
I've noticed curiously recently that I don't like to use the word 'hope' even in causal conversation - don't like to hear myaelf saying "we can always hope" and am uncomfortable when I hear others say it. I think that intuitively I've come to an awarenss about 'hope' much in line with your thoughts.
I am acutely aware, at nearly every moment, what a mess humanity, all life, and the earth itself are in. Rational, logical, thinking strongly suggests to me that we're unlikely to change course in a timely manner. It often seems as if time is up. Nevertheless, there is "something" inside me that compels me to act "as if" I can make a difference in helping humanity find its way - to what I percieve as "humanity's yet undeveloped promise and potential". Similarly, the same internal "mysterious" motivation causes me to act "as if" radical earth-care practices of a single individual will contribute to restoring earth's natural functions that support abundance.
I don't consider myself "hopeful" at all. But I do seem to operate from some kind of optimism that may be more intuitive/instinctive than logical. (I'm retirement age - have 'been there, done that' with "hope" as remedy!)
Very insightful
Very insightful, Will. Thank you, this makes a lot of sense.
namaste
I AM versus I hope to BE
This was excellent! As a student of Metaphysics, we are taught that we are all one consciousness. That every word, thought, and reaction sends a vibration out into the universe and causes a ripple. Your thought becomes my thought as we all have the innate abilities of telepathy, intuition, clairvoyance and clairaudience - even though most of us are not aware or adept at such things. Everything in the universe is vibration - your thoughts are vibration - we are all made up of sound vibrations. Take a look at professor Emoto's study of words on water molecules - (there is alot more Youtube videos on this subject that I will send on that later)
You achieve success and FREEDOM and exactly what you are by letting go of the lower vibrations - fear, greed, want, desire, HOPE, despair
You simply ARE - everything in the universe is divinely perfect which is why they say AS ABOVE, SO BELOW - all is the SAME.
You negatively charge your vibrations with negative thought and physical patterns.
HOWEVER, instead...
YOU BECOME whatever your higher self wants to BE in physical form by manifestation. ( THE SECRET)
For example:
I sure hope I get that job! Nope not going to happen because it is not part of your essence you are not vibrating the truth- hope is negative. ( now in some cases of course you still get the job becasue the universe knows what you need despite yourself :-) )
Instead, replace this statement with:
I AM perfectly aligned with my higher purpose. If this postition is aligned with my higher purpose, I accept this job. AND SO IT IS.
You are divinely decreeing that If it is in your higher best interest - IT IS SO
This is in the NOW not the future.
Another example:
I am beautiful, intelligent, creative, prosperous in everything I do. I am my perfect weight. The universe supports me in everythying I DO. AND SO IT IS.
You must divinely DECREE IT IS SO - IN THE NOW
YOU ARE POWERFUL!!! YOU CREATE YOUR OWN REALITY - we all have so much power to be and have exactly what is our divine right - stop wanting stop wishing - YOU ARE YOU HAVE...
GO FOR IT!!! :-) For the universe (your higher God mind) does support your every move in the NOW.
Love and Light,
Blueskygal