"There were times in my life when I didn't have the strength to hold hope for myself. I believe that each one of us has a tiny and tender pilot light in our soul that keeps our will to live alive. At one point, it felt as though my flame had gone out. In my first book, Calm Within the Storm, I wrote about how my flame didn't extinguish in a single moment. I navigated a tumultuous adolescence and tried to ask for help in all the wrong ways: addiction, self-harm, self-sabotage, broken relationships."
"What I needed wasn't fixing. I needed someone who could sit with me in the darkness and remind me I wasn't alone. During a dark season, it was my mom who held hope for me. She believed in a future I couldn't see yet. She showed me what she hoped for me. Her unconditional love and steady belief that I could do hard things helped me reignite that flame and start believing again."
Personal experience includes severe numbness, addiction, self-harm, and self-sabotage during adolescence, and the sense that an inner "pilot light" keeping the will to live had gone out. A mother's unconditional love and steady belief provided hope that reignited that inner flame. Viktor Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning offered perspective, acceptance, and a sustaining throughline of hope during depression. Hope can be cultivated as a practice, borrowed and shared from others, and maintained through individual strategies and supportive relationships. Reflective questions prompt consideration of personal images, memories, and sources of hope.
Read at Psychology Today
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