April—The National Month of Hope. What should this mean to us?

Now is the time when citizens all over the country must band together and work towards one goal: promoting hope. Through months of trials and tribulations, we must all join together as one voice and one body in order to reach one common objective. Hope is something that must be built up by the people and is certainly a necessity to all.

According to a Dec. 2011 Psychology Today article, psychologists have proposed many different types of psychological vehicles that encourage to get us where we want to be and what we want to do. Grit, conscientiousness, self-efficacy, optimism, passion and inspiration are few examples that are all important. One vehicle, however, is particularly undervalued and underappreciated in psychology and society: hope.

CHS received a bomb threat Feb. 21. Though the threat was proved to be fake, we can’t deny the unsettling fear that was placed within us. Events like these are mostly out of our control, but what we can do is support and encourage each others while building up hope as a community.

According to a Jan. 2018 Aleteia article, hope, optimism and foresight form a family of strengths that all share a positive attitude towards the future. Expecting positive events to take place, and feeling that they will come to pass if you make an effort and plan for the future, foster a good mood in the present and motivate a life directed towards objectives.

When faced with bad news after a bad day, week or month it is easy to despair over humanity’s future. Though we cannot allow the shortcomings of politics convince us that change for the better is impossible. We have to not only hope, but act upon it.

According to a Dec. 2016 Good Men Project article, hope is what gets us through tough times. Hope is the belief that we will heal; that we can create a loving, abundant and peaceful future. Hope is also the belief that there is good in the world right now.

Though some may say hope is a sort of illusion and much can still be accomplished just the same without hope, according to a Dec. 2011 Psychology Today article, those lacking hope tend to adopt mastery goals. People with mastery goals choose easy tasks that don’t offer a challenge or opportunity for growth. When they fail, they quit. People with mastery goals act helpless and feel a lack of control over their environment. They don’t believe in their capacity to obtain the kind of future they want. All because they have no hope.

Students around the nation have been coming together to build a foundation of hope within our country. CHS must come together to build an environment built on this foundation, allowing students to feel safe in a setting that has proven to be high-risk numerous times.

Hope inspires us to do better. When we’re hopeful, we are able to take action to create something better because we soon learn to believe that we have the capability to do so. Through all the hurt, there is always a path to healing. Hope inspires us to take action—to move toward a solution rather than getting stuck in fear and anger. Hope is a leap of faith, a belief that we can stop our collective damage and return to safety and health. Let’s choose hope.