The Dynamic Power of Hope
"If you ask (people) what they want in a leader, they usually
list three things: direction or vision, trustworthiness, and
optimism. Like effective parents, lovers, teachers, and
therapists, good leaders make people hopeful." -- Warren Bennis,
An Invented Life: Reflections on Leadership and Change
Someone once said to the bestselling author and television
pastor, Robert Schuller, "I hope you live to see all your dreams
fulfilled." He replied, "I hope not, because if I live and all
my dreams are fulfilled, I'm dead. It's unfulfilled dreams that
keep you alive." Hope is one of the most powerful sources of
energy ever known to humankind. Without hope, we slip from
living to just existing. Hope charges our spirit and draws us
forward to a better tomorrow. Hope helps us see beyond the
problems to the possibilities. Hope gives life meaning. Hope
helps us take responsibility for our choices. Hope stretches us
and energizes our continuous growth and development. Hope urges
us to go against the odds and do what everyone knows can't be
done.
All the great achievements and tiny triumphs recorded through
the history of civilization began as a hope, a dream, in
someone's mind. An ancient Chinese proverb teaches, "Happiness
is someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for."
"False hope" is an oxymoron; the two words don't belong
together. Hope can't be false. It might be unfulfilled, but it
can't be false. If hope makes me try a little longer, strive a
little further, live a little more, dream a little clearer, or
raise my expectations a little higher, how can it be false?
But in the face of despair, negativity, and feelings of
helplessness, being hopeful is hard work. It's easier to reflect
the temperature of a negative environment and be a pessimist. It
doesn't take as much effort to give up hope and become a victim.
Then it's somebody else's fault. It doesn't take much courage to
be a cynic that sees things only as they are, not as they could
be.
The 19th century American clergyman and abolitionist, Henry Ward
Beecher, defined the feeble-mindedness of the pessimist or cynic
as "one who never sees a good quality in a man and never fails
to see a bad one. He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and
blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game.
The cynic puts all human actions into two classes -- openly bad
and secretly bad."
A leader brings hope. That doesn't mean putting on rose-colored
glasses, painting on a happy face, and avoiding problems by
spouting cliches on positive thinking. Highly effective leaders
help others deal with the reality of current problems by
focusing their attention on what's possible. They use the dream
of what could be as a magnet to draw everyone forward.
Highly energized cultures are charged with hopefulness and
optimism. It's the dynamic power that mobilizes individuals and
teams to make the improbable possible. It's the mark of a
leader.