We Always Have Hope

I’ve been thinking a lot about Pandora lately. About how she let all the evils of the world, all the miasma, tragedy, depression, heartbreak, anger and violence just floated away. All she kept was hope. I know a lot of folks interpret this as a an Eve-esque story of woman inflicting evil on the world. It’s true in Greek mythos Pandora, the all-gifted, is the first woman, but I don’t think she inflicted evil on the world. I think she taught us how to let go.

It’s a valuable gift, the ability to let go. We let go when we meditate. We let go when we dance with abandon. We let go when we make love. We let go in religious ecstasy. We let go when we forgive.

Anger, stress, worry, and anxiety aren’t good for our health. They can lead to more serious medical problems if we don’t learn to deal with them. If we don’t learn to let go.

Sometimes we don’t want to lose those feelings, those pressures. Sometimes they are comfortable, sometimes they feel necessary. The tools we have to let go of them feel like a selfish indulgence. Can we really afford 15 minutes of meditation when we have a report due, kids to be fed and laundry piling up?

I think the story tells us when we let go, we’re not left with nothing. Letting go leaves us with room for hope. Maybe that doesn’t seem like much, but it’s hope that keeps us moving forward, keeps us building, growing and learning. If you have to hold on to something, you do worse than to hang on to hope.