What I learned when hope wasn't enough.
I've spent much of my life believing that things always get better. I told myself that if I didn't like my current circumstances, they'd eventually improve. Inevitably, they did. My life experience is why hope is such a fundamental state of mind for me.
That's probably why I love roller coasters so much. They're fast and exciting, filled with ups, downs, twists, turns, and loops, and every time I ride one, I step off laughing and grinning uncontrollably. For me, life is an exhilarating and sometimes scary roller coaster ride. I connected hope with the Buddhist teaching of impermanence: the highs pass, the lows pass, and knowing that has always kept me moving forward. How could I not be filled with hope?
There were times when the ride got too difficult, and I'd step off and sit on the sidelines for a while. There were prolonged slumps, but even then, they were punctuated by moments of joy and excitement. Hope carried me through because I had faith that things would improve. And they always did.
Now, I find my relationship with hope evolving. Subtly, but noticeably.
I'm still comforted by hope, but I've noticed that I get complacent when I lean too heavily into it. I wind up sitting on my butt, waiting for the inevitable changes rather than doing something to create the life I want. When I focus too much on hope, I drift out of the present moment. I stop seeing what's right in front of me. I get too focused on what might be, rather than what is.
That's a recipe for suffering, and I'm done doing that to myself.
When I reached that awareness, I started paying attention to what actually motivated me to take action. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that hope was my starting point, which led to desire, which led to action, and that action was what created the experiences I wanted. Hope mattered. It just wasn't the whole story.
As someone who has spent his entire life navigating a host of neurodivergent challenges, including major depression, lack of motivation is a very real obstacle. So I had to ask myself honestly: what motivated me to act when I was in my darkest state of mind?
In a word: gratitude.
Gratitude unfailingly directs my attention to the present moment. When I'm grateful, regardless of my circumstances, I naturally fall into my default state of joy. And joy, even just a tiny flicker of it, does something remarkable: it gives me hope. Not the passive, waiting kind of hope, but the active kind. The kind that inspires me to get up, take action, and create the circumstances I want to experience.
That's the evolution I've been trying to articulate. Hope didn't lose its place in my life. It found a better one. Gratitude is the door I walk through to get back to it, especially on the days when hope feels far away. Gratitude returns me to the present, joy meets me there, and hope, the real kind, rises naturally from that place.
So when I don't know where to start, I start there. Grateful for everything: the highs, the lows, and everything in between. That's not the end of the journey. That's where the journey begins.
Be well. Be joyous. Be grateful. Always.
—Appio
