5 - BELIEVE.

To hope is not to believe.

Dear reader,

Welcome home.

Before you begin, I'd like you to ensure that you are comfortable and ready to read with me.

Read?

Certainly.

Because I'm reading my own mind, as I'm putting certain items from inside, into sentences.

Today, I'll be sharing my thoughts with you about a quote, “...hope is fundamental for change”, I have encountered just a minute ago.

The quote belonged to a psychologist, about the beginning of their training, something they are taught in the very beginning. I'd never underestimate an expert, however I feel there has been a miscommunication between the words in that sentence.

I'm not here to criticize the order of those words.

I'm here to enlighten how that order has been, continuously and unconsciously, impacting and shaping our lives, in an extremely strong way.

Hope is either not choosing or being able to take an action. Hope means having no control over something. You wish it, but you only wish it. Hope brings desperation, and even if you had control over that certain thing, might be an event, a relationship, a motion, a situation, look carefully because I believe you just handed out your own ropes to “hope” and chose to be a puppet instead.

My apologies, if those words sounded cruel or unusual to you but if you are here to read what you'd like to hear, unfortunately this is not the right place for you.

This is a place located between reality and conformity, at least until our current tenant asks us to leave the place because now has just decided to live here. Ere then, I'll stick around.

I don't like making a rain check on my words, they might not be available, or worse nowhere to be found, later on. I encourage you to do the same, if there is something you'd like to say, whatever that might be, take a step and say it. You will thank yourself when you see where it gets you as the time goes by. One more thing before I return to the topic, being grateful. Thanking the worst and the best, remembering it was the worst that got you to the best. It was your mistakes, betrayals you withstood, wars you survived and learned to sign a peace treaty. You did it. You did it all, by yourself. So for that, be always aware of and grateful to your achievements. You have done it all. When the time comes, you might feel overwhelmed or under pressure, stress, nevertheless remember you have done it all before. You can and will do it again. Believe that you can.

And with that, let's rebound with our current topic. To hope is not to believe.

I have a small request with four steps:

• Please close your eyes.

• Think about something, can be anything, that you'd want the most at the moment. (I'll refer to it with “...“)

• Slowly, say this sentence out loud: “I hope...”

• Now again slowly say this sentence out loud: “I believe...”

How did you feel? Were there any differences?

I felt desperate, unable to do anything about it, completely tied up, when I built the sentence with “I hope...”.

However, when “I believed” that thing was going to happen, I felt like I created my own reality, I just needed time to reflect it into the real world. I had control over it, I had a voice and I had a choice.

These are my thoughts about it. I'd love to hear your experiences and feelings. I respect them, even if we are in the different pages, because you are another human being, your process of thinking is unique and it's fascinating.

I'll tell you a story about me.

A couple of months ago, I decided not to allow myself to use the word “hope”. Why? Because, my success should not have to depend on outer sources. It should depend on me; my passion and my best of effort to make it.

What happened later on is that, I never depended on any source to create any kind of opportunity for me, I was determined to build my own doors, and windows if necessary. In a month or so, I got a chance to get paid for whom I acknowledged and undertook myself to be, for my true passion. It happened because I took a step on it, chased it with persistence. What I wasn't aware back then is that it was only the beginning of everything. Everything I craved to surround myself with. Believe it or not, but until late 2019, I never believed that I could be a writer. I conceded it in the last December by a brand ambassadorship, being picked in a pool of about 200 people as a writer. I didn't know what it meant for the rest of my life back then. Wasn't I writing? I was, madly. I had a thick black file where I was archiving my writings, separated them accordingly to their certain type. It was more valuable than gold to me, priceless, and still is.

The brand called me out loud, as who I am, that day, for the first time, yet I was still choosing not to be aware and rejecting it. When I say it like that, it might sound impossible but look at where you are.

I was an image, and that's alright, as long as you are not in denial about your true personality. You might not be ready to say it out loud at the moment, I wasn't, and it's okay so long as you know it in your heart.

Here is the other part of the quote that I completely agree with, by Lisa Orbe.

In conclusion, hope is not fundamental for a change, your belief in yourself is.

Stop hoping.

Start;

• Dreaming

• Believing

• Setting goals

• Building your own doors and windows towards it

• Eventually, climbing that mountain

Keeping in mind that,