I’m Losing Hope

A few years ago, I went through an unexpected breakup and it challenged me in a lot of ways I didn’t see coming. It was the first time I’d ever had a relationship end because both people realized that our relationship with each other wasn’t for the highest good, even though we shared an abundance of love.

There were no arguments, no friction, and no conflict. What we shared was just a lot of love that wanted to be experienced and expressed in ways that couldn’t work out between the two of us.

This was new to me. My previous breakups were always due to fundamental problems between me and the other person that eventually led to the breakup. Most of them were also quite dysfunctional.

This time, my mind couldn’t grasp the idea that an abundance of love could go-exist with completely valid, real, and important reasons to end the relationship.

My mind began to notice all the ways I’d attached future experiences to this person…

I had planned some really wonderful date ideas. I dreamt of perfect gift ideas, and not just good ideas for dates and special occasions. I imagined amazing gifts that were really attuned to the unique relationship that we shared.

What amplified the pain is that we both also knew that we would have lived an amazing life together. We shared amazing synergy on so many levels. As I felt into those feelings of perfect alignment and an incredible future, I realized how much I had emotionally invested in a future that didn’t exist.

After the breakup, my mind kept coming back to all the ways we fit together perfectly. All the amazing ideas and expectations I had for the future. Or in another word:

All my hopes.

In really reflecting on hope, I came to understand what one of my spiritual teachers has been saying for years about the Hope / Desire / Rejection cycle.

In a nutshell, it works like this:

First we have a hope. We have an idea about some way we want our future life to be. Then that hope buries itself deeper into our heart as a desire. No longer is it just wishful thinking, it becomes a heartful wish.

At first that sounds great. Especially if we want to get more out of life. Unfortunately, that very cycle of hoping and desiring a better future leaves us in a state of rejection of the present moment. By me continually running the stories (and associated emotions) of a hopeful future, I was rejecting the only thing that actually exists: Now.

Since then, every time I have felt sadness or pain, I’ve been able to trace it back to my hope about a future that I realize will not happen.

This has been an uncomfortable exploration.

My mind doesn’t like the idea that my hope is actually causing me pain. It wants to believe that hoping for a different future, a happier future, will somehow actually bring me happiness. Unfortunately it doesn’t. It can’t. That’s just not how the future works.

Consequently, I’ve been “losing” hope ever since that breakup.

Instead of letting my mind and heart get stuck running in circles hoping for a future that won’t exist, I’m being more present with my immediate experience. I’m learning what it means to let go of a non-existent future and to more fully embrace what actually is.

What has come more fully into my experience is a sense of faith and optimism. I trust that all is for the highest good. I trust that as I deepen into the present moment, that will cascade into future moments that will continue to be increasingly more amazing.

I no longer know exactly how that will look. I just know that by “losing” my hope, I’m continually opening up to, allowing for, and embracing, whatever magnificence the mysterious and unknown future has for me.

I’ve also discovered that faith is fundamentally different than hope. Hope has a very specific outcome that we attach to. We hope for things to turn out a certain way.

Faith on the other hand is unattached. It knows that things will turn out fine, even amazing, and that we can’t know or imagine what that outcome will be.

Hope is born of our minds. It’s of our egos. It tells us how it thinks the world should be. Then when life doesn’t go the way we had “hoped,” we feel the pain and rejection inherent within the hope.

Faith is born of our hearts and spirits. It’s of our true nature. It tells us that no matter how the world is, it is for the highest good. When life unfolds naturally as the mystery it is, we get to experience ourselves as heros on an adventure. Even though we don’t know where the next turn leads, faith tells us that we’re on the right path headed towards something important.

So yes, I’m continually “losing” hope and and feeling more optimistic and faithful than ever before.

This insight has allowed me to heal much faster from breakups, both that one and those that followed. My pain shifts to love more quickly, unfulfilled expectations flow into gratitude, and my feelings of being left behind or abandoned now show me all the ways in which I’m incredibly supported.

I also am more fully experiencing and expressing unconditional love. My heart is expanding in directions I never could have “hoped” for, and for which I am grateful.

I’ve learned that I can walk away from an enjoyable, good, and loving relationship because it truly isn’t for the highest good. In doing so, I gift myself enough space in my life for the truly incredible, amazing, abundant relationship that I know is waiting for me, and that will also be in alignment for the highest good.

I have no “hope” or expectation about how that divinely inspired relationship will look. That’s not my hope.

I just have faith and optimism that the Divine has got this one covered.

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