At any time in life, I find myself facing things that seem horrific and daunting. One day I realized that all humans are selfish, and was depressed for a week. Another time I felt lonely, and wondered if I was doomed to hermitage.

perspective.

Yet I have survived these things; surpassed them on the spiritual journey that is life. I will continue to survive. Who do I believe this? Because I have realized that every stage in life is just that, a stage. There will be an end to my temporary tribulations, and each test brings a quickening of the mind. I can hope.

I have realized one can hope for change, and be dissapointed. Sometimes the change never occurs. There are two sources of hope besides this.

  • always Hope for the next piece of the puzzle. Oftentimes I am depressed very much by what seems to be a crippling piece of intelligence - at one time I felt that no one I knew was capable of higher levels of conversation. These people have not changed. But I have met new people, new circumstances; I have aquired enough pieces of the puzzle to see how the contrast of the light and the dark create a stunning tapestry.
  • every day Hope for adaptation; humans can adapt to almost anything, as was proved in the Holocaust. I have gotten used to the idea of not being able to satisfy my delusions of grandeur. I can live with that. Sometimes that which seems most terrible is a mouse in hindsight.
  • Hope is so powerful because sometimes in focusing on a problem we allow that problem to define us; we allow that blackness to taint everything so that we can not even remember the light - as a case in point, people in unhappy marriages have trouble remembering any happy point in the entire marriage. Hope allows us to remember the light that has come, and hope allows us to see the light that will come.

    But back to my original two problems. In the case of the first, I realized that a divine will could allow us to transcend our selfishness. The second problem was resolved when I discovered E2.