Hope

Defining Hope

We define hope as thinking positively that we are capable of achieving our goals, and being able to think of specific ways to make them come true. It also means that when things don’t always go right the first time, we are flexible and creative enough to think of new ways to make our goals happen. Having hope means saying “I can do this!”, and being able to focus on your past successes rather than your past failures to help motivate yourself.

Why is it important to foster hopefulness in children?

Research* shows that thinking rather than emotion is at the core of hope. Meaning that we can learn, and be taught, how to be hopeful! This is good news because being a high hope person is associated with better outcomes in academics, athletics, physical health, psychological adjustment and psychotherapy.

It is important, however, to know that your ability to feel like you are capable of reaching your goals, and your ability to think of clear paths to achieving those goals is learned primarily during childhood. Therefore most adults lack hope because they were not taught to think in a hopeful way as children, or because something happened to destroy their hopefulness (such as abuse, neglect, or the death of a parent).

There are a lot of things that can make a child more likely to be a low hope person, but fortunately there is a lot that we as caregivers can do to foster high hope in children too. Our hope is that this curriculum will be a small piece of helping you do just that for the children you care for!

"For me, as a parent and a researcher, one of the most powerful ideas that emerged from my study on raising children with courage, compassion and connection, is the idea that hope is learned. We can absolutely teach our children how to be hopeful - we can teach them how to set goals, how to believe in their abilities, and how to struggle through adversity. Of course, the most powerful way to teach hope is to model it. We have to let our children see us succeed, see us struggle, and see us fail. Our kids need to see us staying hopeful, even when "Plan B, C, or D" doesn't work. Tenacity and creativity are contagious. I just can't imagine a more valuable legacy than passing down the gift of hope."

-- Brené Brown, Ph.D., LMSW

References

*Snyder, C.R. (2002).Hope Theory: Rainbows in the Mind. Psychological Inquiry. 13, 249-275.