I could write a book about "Hope"

Hope is something that I, for sure, could NOT live without.

Not to be incredibly depressing for the sake of being depressing, but imagine being in a place of completely and utter hopelessness.  The most hopeless situation I could imagine would be to find yourself in a small cell of unbreakable stone, with all walls sealed shut.  No doors, no windows, no skylight--no openings at all.  You know for a sure fact that there is no drill, no blunt object, no chisel that could possibly break the stone.  You're trapped and there is absolutely NO WAY OUT.  And just to top it off, imagine being immortal--not even death will be an escape.  And on top of that, you're completely alone--you still feel love for others and longing to be with those who you care about, but you know that you'll never see any of them again.

I don't know about you, but the thought of that makes me shudder. If you read my last blog post, you know that confinement is something that scares the pants off me.  But, if I ever was confined like this, I would at least be able to cling to the hope that one day I would be free.  As long as we live on Planet Earth, there are no 100% certainties (except death and taxes, lol) so you would still be able to hope that maybe someone could perfect a way to break through the stone and bust you out.  And if not, at least you would know death would be an escape (not to be depressing... again...).  The confinement would not last eternity.

Without hope, no one would get out of bed in the morning--and, as you know,billions of people who live on earth crawl out from beneath the covers every morning.  There must be something that keeps them going, besides coffee.

I realized my intense need for hope through an event that happened in my life a few months ago.  All of you on Facebook may remember when my fiance and I nearly broke up.  Those of you not on Facebook (which is probably the vast minority of people reading this right now) don't know the story unless you read the 2-part entry called "free" that I wrote in my last blog.  Anyway, that whole day was terrible.  I spent the afternoon on Youtube, watching depressing music videos and happened to come across this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fm0T7_SGee4

I like One Republic and am fond of this song--but the lyrics coupled with this particular music video made me feel incredibly hopeless.  I wanted to stop it--grab hold of the violinist's hand to make him stop playing, snap the drummer's stick in two to stop the beat from relentlessly beating on and on--this couldn't possibly be happening.  I felt the weight of utter hopelessness come falling down upon me.  I really felt that the words "too late" were true--there was nothing I could do to put it back together.  The relationship was shattered into thousands of pieces scattered miles apart and there was no way it could be restored.

So I spent the day in emotional, and physical weakness (I didn't eat a lot)... until that evening, something inside of me snapped.  I realized that I couldn't go one more second feeling that crushing weight of hopelessness, and was suddenly given freedom to change my attitude.  Sitting on my bed, I made a quick plan of action--first stop would be Starbucks to pick up some coffee for my fiance (the best way I could think to help with his exhaustion coupled with an insurmountable pile of homework)--second stop would be his home, although I wasn't 100% sure he would be there.  Third stop would be Chi Alpha (a christian group on campus that meets every Thursday evening), to take my mind off of everything and put my mind on God.  So I carried out my plan in faith, clinging to hope and listening to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWcLQ9a3-J8 just to give me an extra burst of positivity--after that I felt a lot better.  Not completely, but unlike times in the past when I've had conflict with him, I was actually able to fall asleep that night.

Around midnight, as I was just drifting off into sleep, I heard my phone go off.  Of course my ringtone is: "Don't let go, you've got the music in you. One dance left, this world is gonna pull through."  Hopeful in and of itself--made more so when I realized it was my fiance calling me.  Basically, the phone call restored the relationship to normal.  I was so grateful to God in that moment that I could not stop praising Him as I drifted off to sleep.  What a wonderful gift--to have my hopeful prayers answered.

If it weren't for hope, I would have gone crazy that day and definitely wouldn't have been able to act in faith the way I did.  Now, my faith in God and hope for good is increased as a result of this struggle.  

We also rejoice in our sufferings because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character, and character, hope  -Romans  5:3-5