Where Do You Look for and How do You Find Hope?

During my brainstorming session of what I wanted to write about today I came across a video that had no words, only music. The video told a visual story of an underdog rising above the perennial favorite to win the competition the two were engaged in.

It was from this video that I heard the words "people are always looking for hope," speak as clear as day in the depths of my unconscious mind.

Myself being one who advocates the trusting of one's intuition to my clients as well as a continued dedication to improve my own acting on my silent voice - I'm going with this message with the belief that it will connect with exactly who it is meant to.

I once gave a talk on suicide awareness/prevention and one of the key points of that talk was the power of hope - that hope cannot only change lives, it can save them too.

Aside from love, I'm not sure any other emotion has the power that hope does. It can change lives, create lives, pick us up from our darkest places, and inspire us to reach higher than we have ever reached before.

Hope can be the fuel for eradicating diseases (look at the recent work done with polio) and it can inspire the discovery to some of the biggest questions we have (look at Elon Musk's pledge to get to Mars in the next several years).

We know how powerful hope is, how important it is to our overall quality of life, so then why is it sometimes so hard for us to find it?

The short answer of that is: Life.

Life can be extremely hard at times and when we lose our way or something derails us on our journey it can be tough to get going again. This process is made all the more difficult by the stories we tell ourselves and to anyone who will listen.

These stories evolve from "what happened," into "what happened + the impossibility of the future we face." It is in the "impossibility" that hope disappears for the story teller and becomes seemingly elusive.

An example of this "impossibility" in action:

Jane dates Mark then Mark cheats on her. Jane then decides that she cannot risk loving again because ALL men are cheaters.

Jane has closed off her future because she has allowed her pain to paint a picture of a dismal future - a future where all men are cheaters like Mark and Mark hurts Jane.

Here's another example:

Jane dates and marries Mark. They live a happy life with a happy family until suddenly, one day, without warning, Mark dies. Jane is now a widow. Jane feels pain and loss unlike she has ever felt before. Breathing takes effort and eating seems impossible at times. Someone tells Jane that she is depressed, so Jane becomes "Depressed." As her Depression Jane sees a future only through the lens of "no Mark" and a future of "no Mark," = depressing.

Obviously these are condensed down examples and life rarely happens as neat and tidy as I have presented them here. When we experience loss and with it a loss of hope, there are often dozens of other things, people, factors that contribute to the story we tell that limits our hope.

Which leads us to: Where should one look for hope and how should they go about finding it?

The best place to look for hope when you feel an absence of it, is look outward, look to the external world for hope. Look at the smile on a newborn baby, look at the excitement of a dog before they go for their walk, look at the carefree laughter of a child. Look at nature and you will see hope in the form of the blade of grass breaking through the sidewalk, or the first flower of spring to bloom. You will see examples of hope wherever you look.

Finding hope is different. To find hope means one must find hope within themselves. How do you do that when the feeling of hope is absent?

It begins with changing your story by deleting the impossibly hopeless future and rewriting it to allow space for possibility.

Lets go back to Jane to see an example of what I am saying.

When Jane just dated Mark and Mark cheated on her, Jane decided that she could not risk loving again because ALL men are cheaters?

What if Jane changed her story to something like:

"What happened with Mark is heartbreaking and it has made me all the more aware of the type of man I want to date. I know my best friend Sally is married to Jeff who is the most amazing man ever. I am committed to only dating men that embody characteristics similar to Jeff."

In this new story their is the acknowledgement of the pain, but what's different now, is that the future is no longer impossible and Jane's pain has a purpose - a purpose to find someone like Jeff.

In our other example where Jane and Mark were married then Mark died suddenly, what if Jane's story went something more like this:

"Mark was the love of my life and he brought me so much happiness and joy. My heart is broken right now, but I am committed to picking up the pieces one by one because I know Mark would want me to do that. I know Mark would want me to find my happiness again for myself and for our children. I am committed to finding my happiness because by doing so I will be loving Mark and honoring what I know in my heart his wishes for me are."

Again Jane is acknowledging her pain, but she has changed her story to give her pain a purpose (honoring Mark by finding her happiness).

Stories are powerful - they have been how we have passed human history from generation to generation. The stories we tell ourselves are the most powerful.

Hope exists everywhere, but to see it, to find it, and to experience it, the hopeless must change their story.

If you are still reading this, my guess is that you are seeking hope in some way in your life. You may not be seeking it in the same way as Jane. Perhaps you are seeking it for your health, for your self confidence, or your career. Whatever the case may be hope is never lost and it is always there waiting to be found by you.

The discovery begins with the story you tell yourself and about yourself.

Good news is: You are the author of your story. This means you hold the pen that will write your future.

Use it to write a future filled with hope.

Carpe Diem and With Love,

Jesse

http://www.jessebrisendine.com

http://www.facebook.com/1year1000challenge

How to Heal From The Heart Break of Loss

Hi there!

Hope this blog finds you enjoying your day and smiling wherever you are in the world.

I believe a smile is one of the most beautiful expressions we humans have been gifted with.  A smile says so much and each day we are gifted with 24 hours of opportunity to share and express our smiles.

Sadly, so many people do not smile, and for many of them the reason why is because they are handicapped in life by the pain of a loss they endured.

Having struggled through several painful losses of my own, I know, first hand, just how life altering and devastating those losses can be.

Over the years I have had the honor of helping over 4,000 people from all over the world live happier and more fulfilling lives.  Without fail, one of the biggest obstacles I would see people up against, the source of so many of them being "stuck" in life, was loss.

Loss is an inevitable part of life and while we cannot technically prevent that from happening, what we can do is prevent so many beautiful people from suffering so unnecessarily from the ongoing pain of loss.

Recently I hosted a talk on "How to Heal From The Heart Break of Loss," I felt it may be of value to you so here it is.

This talk is intended for those of you who have lost, or know someone who has lost and is struggling with their loss and you want to help them.

My hope is that this video helps you heal and move forward in life.

If you connected with it and would like to take the next step by taking "Healing From Loss," you can sign up here.

It would be my honor to help you Heal From Your Loss.

Carpe Diem,

Jesse

http://www.jessebrisendine.com/healing-from-loss/

My Dad was Not the Best Dad, Which Made him The Best Dad for Me.

A few days ago it was, what would have been, my Dad's 65th birthday.  Sadly he is no longer physically present to celebrate it as my Dad died very suddenly on February 1st 2010.

The irony, (if you can have irony in death,) was that just two weeks prior to my Dad's passing, he was told by his doctor that he was officially a cancer survivor.

After an over two year battle with colon cancer, my Dad had beat it and was told by his doctor that he was in full remission and had has entire life ahead to look forward to.

My Dad had won a hard fought battle and for his efforts his rewarded with the promise of time.

Time to do all the things he had always wanted to do.

Time to make his priorities a priority.

Time to say I love you more.

Time to forgive and let go of past pain.

Time to travel and see the world.

Time to laugh with friends and connect with family.

Time to live life with a renewed appreciation after having been so close to death.

My Dad was promised, and given, time.... two weeks of it.

Not what he, I, or anyone else assumed, but that is what happened.

On his birthday I took a few moments to reflect on my Dad and what his death has meant to my life, as well as what his legacy is to me.

I recorded these thoughts so I could share them with You.

When I initially shared the video last week on Facebook I got an email from someone asking me "How can you open up and share the way you do."

It is certainly not easy to do so and there are a lot of emotions that come up during the process of sharing.  I do share because with all my heart, I believe what I have experienced and what I have learned from those experiences is meant to be shared.  I feel it would be wrong of me to keep what I have to offer and the insights I have gained locked away - hidden from others.

It is my deepest hope that you are able to find value in what I share and perhaps my words are able to help some of you who are dealing with a significant loss of your own.

Enjoy the pics (they are all of my Dad and I),

Carpe Diem,

Jesse
http://www.jessebrisendine.com
http://www.facebook.com/1year1000challenge

 

Moving Forward

It is funny… in a blog that I have titled "Moving Forward," I have found myself stuck the last few days on what to say here.  Even as my fingers move around on the keyboard, I am still not sure what is going to come out.

I have had moments of insight the last few weeks, profound, (or at least what I believe are profound,) thoughts that I want to share with you all.  I have taken notes as they come up so I do not forget them, but then there is the whole "how do I introduce this," dialogue that I have with myself.

Do I just lay it out in bullet points?

• profound thought A
• profound thought B
• etc…

Eh, that doesn't really have the effect does it or seem that profound?

Death is an interesting process.  I use the word interesting because I find it interesting how one event, someone's passing, can create a different experience for so many people.

Death brings up more of a variety of thoughts and feelings then probably any other event in our life.  With death comes the full spectrum of our emotional experience.  We have anger and fear at one end and on the other we have joy and love.  In between there are emotions such as sadness, frustration, happiness, guilt, and so on.

Most fields of psychology will say that the grieving/mourning process follows "x" number of steps.  I am not sure I completely agree with it being as clear cut as that.  From a teaching experience there is a need to compartmentalize our thoughts and emotions into steps.  It gives teachers something tangible to pass onto their students.  It also gives those of us going through the process something tangible that we can work with and towards.

However, from an experiential standpoint, as someone who is going through the mourning/grieving process now and has gone through it in the past; I tend to view it more as a vast open field that is filled with hidden "emotion bombs."

These bombs, whenever you step on one of them, cause their respective emotion to explode inside of you.  

Imagine if you will… You have just lost someone you love and you find yourself walking through a vast open field.  You are not really thinking or feeling anything, you are just kind of "numb," and feel an "emptiness."  As you are walking along you step on one of these hidden emotion bombs.  This one happens to be anger, and when you step it, suddenly this angry feeling explodes inside of you and fills up that "emptiness," and takes away the "numbness," you were experiencing just a few minutes before.

As you travel through the field the anger stays with you.  It may have caused you to run now instead of walk.  It may have removed the caution with which you were moving forward because you are now blinded by the anger inside of you.  This continues until you step on the next emotion bomb.  This one happens to be sadness.  When you step on sadness it explodes inside of you.  This new explosion is so powerful that it is able to push the previous explosion (anger) out of you and now you are able to fully experience sadness.

The process repeats itself over and over again.  You keep traveling through the field and you keep stepping on different emotion bombs.  Anger, sadness, happiness, joy, fear, frustration, excitement, etc… they all show up at some point.

This is the best way I can describe how I have felt the last few weeks.  Like I am going through the field, stepping on different bombs from time to time.  What sets off one bomb may be clear, what sets off another one may be a mystery, but none the less, the bombs go off and the feelings are there.

I understand that it is important to allow myself to acknowledge and feel those feelings.  Some of which I may not necessarily want to, but I need to because it is all part of my process.

The field has no end to it because the field is ones' journey through life.  What can end is the presence of the "emotion bombs." They will gradually dissipate and eventually disappear completely as you go through the mourning/grieving process and as you allow yourself to heal.

Allowing yourself to heal… 

I believe that one of the greatest tragedies to ever befall humans is the tragedy that we choose to hold onto so much of the hurt, the loss, the let down, the failures, that we prevent ourselves from ever fully healing.  Thus robbing ourselves of being able to experience those feelings of happiness, joy, pleasure, elation, etc… at a higher level and more consistently.

We experience tragedy in life, we get hurt, we experience pain, and then we never move past it, instead we choose to hold onto it.  The hurt and loss becomes our new reality and we humans have sadly become experts at forming an identity around hurt and loss.

Why do we do this, why?  

I have a theory, but that is for another time and place; another blog.

As previously mentioned, I do have some thoughts/insights that have come to mind the last few weeks, as I have tip toed my way through the "emotion bomb" field, that I would like to share with you all:

I am going to go for the bullet point approach here :)

• What will it take to get people to a place that they celebrate life with the same intensity that they mourn death?
• It is so important to say and do what's most important while you have the breath to do so.
• I have felt sad a lot the last few weeks.  A lot of times people think of sad as a negative feeling, but in situations such as this, I disagree.  I believe sadness is an important emotion to allow yourself to feel in times of loss.  I believe sadness is the yin to the yang of love.  Thus sadness is a way of reminding you the depth of love you felt for the person you lost.
• Sadness continued:  Just because you feel sadness does not mean you have to become sadness or let it control your life.
• How you choose to live your life after you have lost someone is ultimately how you choose to honor that person.
• Whenever you experience loss you have a choice: choose to let the loss define you or choose to define the loss.

As I continue to move forward I have thought a lot about how challenging life can be at times.  It has been my experience that every challenge I have faced, every tragedy I have endured, has ultimately made me stronger and more capable of fulfilling my purpose on this Earth.  I believe the present one will prove the same.

For now, I will leave you with a phrase I have been thinking about quite a bit over the last few weeks.  These words of wisdom come from one of the great thinkers and philosophers of modern time… Rocky Balboa (aka Sylvester Stallone). 

"The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It's a very mean and nasty place and I don't care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't about how hard ya hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward."

I guess what he is saying, is that we have a choice… :)

Enjoy the pics,

Carpe Diem,

Jesse

http://jessebrisendine.com/healing-from-loss/