Hope Horizon

During times of illness, trauma, & crisis, hope is an oasis, but often times it can feel like a mirage on the edge of the horizon.

Sometimes we have to wait for it.

Hope can shimmer in many forms: 
the elusive cure to come, the relentless pain to ebb, the overwhelming fear to ease, the sapped strength to return, and the paralyzing panic to cease. 
Or simply a promised visitor to arrive, a sturdy shoulder to cry on, a helping hand to reach, an understanding ear to listen, and a promise of help to become realized.

Hope is a belief in relief and survival.

But, like crisis, waiting isn't easy and can carry real weight. A weight that may not be adequately understood by those not carrying it and living with it daily.

It is not easy to quantify or explain. It can overwhelm and steal the voice we need to be heard. How do you tell someone what it is to be you? How can someone know what a gift hope is, when they are not trapped in needing it so urgently?

Time is different for those trying to survive and cling to hope. The waiting can make minutes feel like days and days feel like an infinity. Waiting can corrode our glimmers of hope, deepen our depression, and add to our stress. Waiting can take the fight out of us and leave us lost near collapse in the desert.

Withering in the heat with the relief of the oasis just out of our grasp. It's harder to maintain hope when you are watching the promise of it along what begins to seem like a ever distancing horizon.

Faith is not easy when parched. Hope can slip from our grasp while we wait.

Try to hang on. Seek for and cling to the hope you once had and believe in something... someone, anything, and anyone to make it through. It is coming. While the horizon may seem fixed in the distance, journeying towards it is the only way to reach an oasis of hope. We all need to believe that.