I always look forward to the winter solstice, the day when we in the Northern hemisphere get the least amount of daylight of any time of year. It is not because I love gray and dark days, but the opposite: Now I know that the days are only going to get longer (and sunnier) from here on out. Winter is not going to last forever. It gives me hope.
There are many academic definitions of hope. Typically, we think of hope as a strong desire for something where it is uncertain whether that desire will be fulfilled. Important aspects of hope include the belief that there are multiple ways we can achieve our goal (i.e., “pathway thinking”) as well as conviction that we have the ability to do so (i.e., “agency thinking”). Our hopes might involve feeling excitement and joy, such as the hope that our next first date will be the love of our life, or they might involve a desire to reduce current or future suffering, such as hope that our recent cancer diagnosis is treatable or that our grief will subside after the loss of a loved one.
While hope is related to increased well-being and life satisfaction, hopelessness (the lack of hope) is often considered a core component of depression. Hopelessness is one of the strongest predictors of suicidal thinking in people who are depressed and related to more severe depression symptoms. For these and other reasons, hope is an important component of our mental health.
At the same time, maybe it’s hard for you to have hope in the dead of winter, or perhaps reading the daily news only fills you with dread that the world is getting worse. It can feel naive to be hopeful. However, research suggests that it is times like these where it is most important to cultivate hope. For example, researchers who study people’s attitudes and actions towards climate change (a complicated topic where one might feel hopeless) find that hope is related to one’s likelihood of engaging in efforts that attempt to combat the consequences of climate change. Specifically, “constructive hope” (e.g., acknowledging the reality of climate change while still believing that humanity will devise solutions, or having strong “agency thinking” related to one’s ability to effect change) is related to doing more things to address climate change, while hope based on denial (e.g., people denying the reality of climate change as a means of reducing their worries) is related to doing less. In other words, hope may be a prerequisite for collective action.
So how can we cultivate more hope in our lives? Studies in older adults show that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is effective in reducing hopelessness. Components of CBT like positive reappraisal strategies and tolerating uncertainty might be crucial in promoting more hope. Indeed, inherent in the idea of having hope is that we are uncertain about the outcome of our desires/goals. In times of uncertainty, it can be easy to fall into unhelpful thinking strategies like “fortune-telling” (e.g., “I’m never going to feel better, so I’m just going to skip my next therapy appointment”) or minimization (e.g., “My vote doesn’t matter”). Instead, we can try to reappraise, or rethink, the situation in a more realistic and hopeful manner as a way to confront difficult situations (e.g., “I guess I don’t know whether I will feel better or not, but if there’s a chance my therapist can help me, I should still go to our appointment”) as well as focus on what we actually have control over in our lives (e.g., reminding yourself how important voting is for your values, acknowledging other things you have done or can do to feel civically engaged).
Rather than view hope as naive or use it to deny reality, we can instead see it as a means through which we survive and thrive under difficult and uncertain times. It is how we move forward into the darkness with the conviction that, at the very least, spring is just around the corner.
Jasmine Mote, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist at Cambridge Psychology Group and Research Assistant Professor at Boston University. As part of the Approach Motivation and Participation Lab, she is interested in understanding the social and emotional difficulties of people living with serious mental illness. At CPG, Dr. Mote specializes in treating mood and anxiety disorders, psychosis-spectrum disorders, new parenthood, perinatal mental health, and racial/ethnic identity. If you like her writing, you can subscribe to her newsletter Mental Healthy, where she discusses mental health research related to pregnancy and parenting.