What is hope?

Psychologists, who have a tendency to pick things apart that simply cannot be picked apart, have studied the bird called Hope and think they know how it works. They call it a "cognitive-motivational construct" and count it amongst the countless abilities that humans apparently possess to a greater or lesser extent.

Hope is a predictor of global life satisfaction, they say. The more hopeful you are, the more satisfied you will be. Hopeful people are also better able to cope with life’s difficulties. It correlates with internalising behaviour (turning emotions inwards) but not with externalising behaviour (bottling up emotions).

This and more was established on the basis of questionnaires distributed to secondary school-aged children in America. The psychologists had not asked themselves where hope comes from. It’s simply there, they must have thought.* Hope has settled in your soul, and now sings its song there.

What does hope look like? Here are two stories about hope in a hopeless world.

Berlin, summer 1945. The war is over, and most of the city is in ruins. Women write messages for their husbands on the rubble, as they are due to return from the front. They sit in the streets on the day of their return, chipping mortar from bricks that will be used to rebuild their city.

Gaza, autumn 2025. Arwa Nayef has lost everything: her life, her work, her home. She lives in the midst of a city bombed to pieces, and her children are hungry. Yet, she refuses to give up. "I wasn’t alone. None of us was alone. Gaza is full of women who are quietly resilient, painfully resourceful and stubbornly hopeful." **

The tendency to see hope as something that "belongs to you", that resides in your soul, and from which you can draw strength to face life’s difficulties, is strong but misleading. Hope is a living organism that sings for you, a companion, an ally, greater than yourself. It is the community in which you live, and which will remain even when you are no longer here. You share it with others, even when there is nothing left to share.

Hope is a feathered creature that has made its nest in your soul. It is already there before you know how to move forward.

* Michael F. Valle, E. Scott Huebner, and Shannon Suldo, M. ‘An analysis of hope as a psychological strength’, Journal of School Psychology, 2006, vol. 44, nr. 5, p. 393-406.

** UNDP: Finding light in the darkest moments: Arwa Nayef’s story of resilience. 1 September 2025.

On Staff's Viewpoint, UU's employees share their views with the UU community. Jaap Bos, Associate Professor of Social and Behavioural Sciences, is one of the columnists invited to write for DUB's Dutch page. This column has been translated from Dutch.