Active Hope (revised): How to Face the Mess We’re in with Unexpected Resilience and Creative Power

by Joanna Macy

If we hold in mind the best that could happen as well as the worst, what can we do to make better scenarios more likely and worse ones less so?

“What happens through you?” Which story do you hope will grow stronger and happen more through you?

Three Acts of Opening.

They faced the uncertainty by bringing to it their intention. They assumed that since you cannot know, you simply proceed. You do what you have to do. You put one stone on top of another and another on top of that. If the stones are knocked down, you begin again, because if you don’t, nothing will be built. You persist. In the long run, it is persistence that shapes the future.

The stronger your sense of belonging to a team, a family, or a community, the more you’ll feel loyalty and a guiding intention to act for what you belong to.

bodhichitta. This is the deep desire to act for the welfare of all beings.