Hope

In the Hunger Games, President Snow tells the gamemaker that there is one thing more powerful than fear: hope.

What is hope?

It's an emotional state that allows one to believe that good will come out of certain circumstances in life. In the Hunger Games, there was the little hope that you could live, that you could be the winner. Prim had hope that Katniss could win. Katniss had hope for Prim's future when she volunteered for her. Peeta had hope that he could help Katniss live. Later in the story, they had hope that they could overcome the evil that had taken over their government. In each of these instances, they all feared. But hope overrode their fear. Without hope, they wouldn't have pushed onward.

I have hope.

I only wish I could tell you everything that has happened in the last two years. It's kind of miserable. There have been times where I feel very little or no hope and I don't know how to go on.

I have hope that I will find and maintain peace and healing in my life.

I have hope that my husband will overcome his addiction and we will be together for eternity.

I have hope that we will have children.

I have hope for positive outcomes in my other trials that I haven't really described on this blog. I have hope. I love that I have hope because when I look back on everything that has happened and all the pain I have suffered, having hope is a tremendous blessing, more beautiful that I even imagined. A year ago, I didn't have this much hope. A year and a half ago, I had even less hope.

I'm so grateful for the power of the Atonement and how it has touched me and brought me hope.

Whenever I fear what the future might bring, I can remind myself what I have overcome, what I have learned, and what I have hope for. I have hope for the future because I have faith in Christ.

I make it sound simple, but I know it's not. We all know it's not. I just hope that my hope can give you hope. That's a lot of hope :)

How can we find that hope? I'll talk about the action steps for step 2 tomorrow, and not at 10 pm, I promise!