OK guys and gals please be gentle with me as this is my first attempt at this. <P>The continuing search for HOPE by AgoodManInTexas.<P>Hope.<P>Hope is an interesting concept. It gets me out of bed in the morning. It gives me the presents of mind to look forward to something new. A new experience, or tickle to my Id.<P>The dictionary defines Hope as follows:<BR>hope (hp)<BR>v. hoped, hop·ing, hopes <BR>v. intr. <BR>1. To wish for something with expectation of its fulfillment. <BR>1. Archaic. To have confidence; trust. <BR>v. tr. <BR>1. To look forward to with confidence or expectation: We hope that our children will be successful. <BR>1. To expect and desire. <P>I have tried to put this completely mental feeling into a physical picture for the purpose of my own personal exploration. <P>Imagine if you will, you are led into the room by a shrouded entity. The room you enter is a completely pitch-dark room, all the lights are off, there are no windows, no vents, and completely silent. A silence so thick you can hear your heart beat. You stretch out your arms with your hands palm side down to try to escape the thought that you will hit something or stub your toe. You pupils dilate, still no light. There is absolutely no movement of the air, just you and the quit. You feel a tingle of fear, as you don’t know what is about to happen. After a few minutes of wonder a small light in the center of the room starts to glow. Its dim at first, then grows brighter and still brighter. You find it’s a very small spotlight that has cast its beam on a small round table. The beam is not strong enough to penetrate the surrounding darkness it only highlights the table. You get a small perception of the room size by the distance between you and the table and the height of the light. Looking from a few short yards away you see a candle setting in the center. The candle is white and about 12 inches tall. It looks like a dinner table candle. Clean, Pure, Simple in its soul purpose, Elegant. The table is waist high and the lights bean is centered with no light passing to the floor. You can now hear yourself breathing. You start to wonder can the candle be lit? As if on queue, at the conclusion of that very thought the candlewick begins to glow and begins to produce a light that is comforting. Since there is no breeze in the room, the candles flame is straight and steady. <P>You move closer to the comfort of the flame. The predicament I am in doesn’t seem so bad as yesterday or the moments before I was lead into the room. You move closer to the small flame, you can see the flame consume the wick slowly with time. You are enthralled, captivated by its beauty. You don’t feel alone. <P>When I got married I was affixed on the candle. Things weren’t that bad. Yes there were problems but it didn’t matter because tomorrow would be another day. Another opportunity to succeed. My beautiful wife I thought loved me, or that’s what I thought at the time. Things weren’t working between us. <P>The candle begins to flicker and dim. You instinctively cup your hands around the candle to protect its light. You start getting scared that you will be alone in the darkness. No way to see your way clear of the obstacles. You don’t even know if obstacles are in the way as your only concern is you will be alone in the dark. <P>Things in my marriage continued to spiral downward. My life sucked. My married life was incredibly unfulfilling. I did not know how to fill my wives emotional needs. I didn’t even know what they were. We had no way of communicating each other’s needs. She drank a lot and when she came home she would lock herself into the master bathroom and talk by phone until the wee hours of the night. I would come home a plop down in front of the TV and eat everything in the house. <P>The candle continues to dim. It flickers and finally twinkles out. The spotlight above is still on and now highlights the smoke that is leaving the candlewick. The smoke slowly rises into the apex of the spots light. You pray that the candle will light again as it did when you arrived. You look at the smoke and can see the small particles. You can smell the smoke as you try remembering its comfort. You reminisce. The glow of the candle is completely out. <P>I filled for divorce. I lost all hope of ever getting back to the comfort zone. The thing I find amazing is that I really never did have the comfort I was really looking for. The comfort zone in my marriage was an illusion in our case, as my wife didn’t know how to express herself without placing blame. And I didn’t know how to articulate my needs with out being perceived as her father. <P>I filled for divorce. I gave up. I began to let go. <P>After a few moments the candles wick begins to glow. You see it, a barely visible whisper of smoke begins to rise. <P>Negotiations are complete the final papers are being drawn up by the attorneys. The end of the relationship from a marital perspective is insight. It’s becoming time to move on.<P>The candle springs back to life. It dances briefly before settling into its consistent shape. You feel comfortable again. I look forward to the next day. <P>I love life. Its fun. <P>Tex.<BR><p>[This message has been edited by AgoodManInTexas (edited June 19, 2001).]

Tex,<P>all i can say is wow...you are a gifted writer. your story is truly beautiful. thank you for sharing it here with all of us.<P>allison

Okay, you are my buddy, so Im going to tell you why I didn't respond to your post at first. Not every single time, but often I have private, more thorough responses to folks with an email, and then I'll copy some or part of what I wrote in the email as a "public" response. I think it helps other folks on the forum to hear some kind of response--maybe an idea of how to proceed or support that "I feel the same way" so I usually take the time to do that. <P>In this instance, though, your post was almost stunning. I didn't know what to say publicly because it was a bit much. You opened up so much and so poetically that I just couldn't thing of a decent response. But I will tell you this, I hope you will continue. It was beautiful. It was moving. It was challenging. It was helpful to me and thought provoking. <P>Just FYI, my life lately has been really tough and I have been trying to concentrate on work while I'm at work, and trying to concentrate on my marriage when I am at home. One question I really do have for you is that your post was about your continuing search for hope, and I was wondering, do you have hope? If so, where did you find it and how did you find it? I am really struggling with this right now, because at times I feel hopeless. Would you be willing to share that ?<P><BR>CJ<P>------------------<BR>Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.

<B>Faithfulwife</B>,<P>You wrote my thoughts exactly. I read this post every day and pondered on how to respond. I even felt some envy that I have yet to see the wick even glow. <P>I have been able to see the candle and recognized that I want it to burn, to feel the comfort of its glow but have been unable to will it to flame.<P><BR>How about it AGoodManInTexas?<BR><p>[This message has been edited by HopelessinAZ (edited June 22, 2001).]

I think the change happened for me when I figured out that you can't WILL it to glow. <P>"I filled for divorce. I gave up. I began to let go. <P>After a few moments the candles wick begins to glow. "<P>The statement After a few moments really may have taken me a month or two. It gave me time to grow and accept my situation.<P>Tex<P>I am going to grow from this period in my life.<P>Thanks for your reply. It means alot to me as I'm letting go and opening up big time. And I trust this site to be honest with me. <BR>

That is the point. The final realization that hope is different from a wish. So many people focus on that one element of the definition (to wish) verb hope and one gets this picture of someone with his eyes closed making a wish. But I think they are two different things. Wishing implies longing, emptiness, anxiety, and/or searching. Hope is comforting, peaceful, and solitary. Wishing is the vacant waiting for the candle to relight. <BR>Hope is the assurance without struggle that it will.<p>[This message has been edited by gsd (edited June 22, 2001).]

GSD:<BR>Interesting??<P>"Wishing is the vacant waiting for the candle to relight."<P>I don't think I ever was wishing for the candle to light. I don't think I ever waited for it to light. Time past and I noticed it.. <P>Now I would totally agree with this statement.<BR>"Wishing implies longing, emptiness, anxiety, and/or searching. Hope is comforting, peaceful, and solitary." <P>I would add that it changes the way your are precieved by others. as an outward representation.<P>Interesting thanks.<P>Tex.

Thanks Tex,<BR>I am glad I took a look at your post (even though late).<BR>It was very thought provoking to say the least!<P>I have a rock with the word "Hope" carved on it, it sits on my bathroom sink, I look at it daily.<P><BR>trying to keep her chin up!<BR>Petrie<BR>

Tex-<BR>The fact that you were not waiting for the candle to light was evident in your post. I think that many people try to change events with their thoughts instead of their actions or just simply sitting back and accepting change as it comes. I am guilty of this myself.

This isn't exactly in direct response to what's been written (which was excellent, BTW), but it is in the same vein of HOPE.<P>On Tuesday of this week, a woman was referred to me as a possible source of getting a logo made for her new organization (I do graphic design). I spoke with her for about 5 minutes about what the org does and told her I'd think about it, as I have several other projects going right now. The next morning, as I sat down at my computer and was thinking about it, a complete logo design came to me. I quickly created and layed it out...the business card, the letterhead, the envelopes, etc. All done in about 2 hrs. <P>And I <I>loved</I> how it looked.<P>So I gave her a call and she came by the office to meet me and see what I had for her. <P>And she <I>loved</I> how it looked. She was actually in tears as she was looking at it, saying how perfect it was.<P>She then went on to tell me all about her org and what her plans for it were, etc. She's the mom of a down's syndrome child....Shane, a 7-yr old, beautiful boy. She is creating a healing center (holistic healing) for others who are dealing with the same type of situation (Shane's World), which will include a birthing center for women who don't want to terminate a ds pregnancy.<P>She also mentioned that she became pregnant with Shane right after her and her H were separated and all their other older kids had left home. And that is was a very difficult time for her to be pregnant....all alone like she was....and knowing that the child would have ds.<P>Anyway, to tie this all together.....the ideas and plans she has for this center..."a center for global joy"....all stem from the joy and love this little boy has given her. I commented to her (with tears in my eyes) that she was a shining example of a person who took something that probably was devastating and turned it into hope. She said it wasn't anything she did....it was what Shane did to her.<P>Anyway, to wrap this up, it was a great way to start this week and remind me once again....that even tho devastating things happen to you, really good things can come from it. BTW, the logo is a globe-like world with a big, brightly-colored rainbow springing from it with multi-colored stars all around. The neat thing was, I didn't really know the full story when I designed it, but now that I do, it is doubly awesome....and I didn't charge her for it.....it was like a gift to me and so I gave it to her as a gift.<P>A rainbow to me speaks so much of HOPE...the promise of good things, even amidst the storm. <P>Aloha and keep the faith, hope and love,<BR>Mrs.O<BR><p>[This message has been edited by Mrs.O (edited June 22, 2001).]

Nice story <B>Mrs.O</B>!! <P>Thinking about my comment on lacking the will to make the candle flame perhaps it is more of a hesitation?<P>I hope but I do not have hope at this point.

thanks goodman and Mrs. O for your inspirational posts. Like several others who've replied, I want to have hope, but I'm not there yet. I believe that I will be able one day to have hope and that I will be able to fully let go.

CJ. You ask if I have hope.. <P>With out question I have hope. As I said in an e-mail to you, I'm exploding with hope. I soar with the eagles. I swim with the dolphins. I am so overloaded with hope about my future I can give some away only to feel even better.<P>The Vstbx went out and bought a new car this morning. I had to go sign the papers at the dealership as her car was in my name. (Me talking here) No problem. You bet, show me where to put the John Henry. Here, Here, and Here? Excellent looking car babe. Good Job. I'll watch the kid tonight if you want so you can go show it off to your friends. .09% interest, excellent. OK, I gotta go and get the kid to the B-day party SOOoooooo.. <P>She kissed the kid, I winked a good job, have fun wink with a knowing smile. and fired up the truck. <P>No swet. Water down a ducks back. <BR>-----<BR>I hope she has a good time. I wish her all the luck in the world. I hope I can keep my job long enough for the CS payments to pay it off.. HeHeHE jab,jab.. ;-) <P>Man, I'm so evil. Snicker,snicker. <P>Tex.. <P>Hope can do wonderful things I think if pointed in the right direction. <P>