{"id":28428,"date":"2022-01-15T22:31:00","date_gmt":"2022-01-15T22:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=28428"},"modified":"2022-01-19T03:26:57","modified_gmt":"2022-01-19T03:26:57","slug":"tackling-2022-with-hope-5-essential-reads","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/tackling-2022-with-hope-5-essential-reads\/","title":{"rendered":"Tackling 2022 with hope: 5 essential reads"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Molly Jackson<\/a>, The Conversation<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Six months ago, it was easy for many Americans to think COVID-19 was on the defensive. Vaccinations were ticking up<\/a> as case numbers ticked down<\/a>. Summer sunshine made hanging out outside actually enjoyable, after a cooped-up winter of socializing with just our pods. Maybe, just maybe, Zoom fatigue<\/a> would soon be a thing of the past.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, that optimism seems miles away. Hospitalizations are hitting new highs<\/a>. Concerns about school safety<\/a> amid climbing case counts have working parents and teachers on edge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re not exactly feeling hopeful about the year ahead, you\u2019re not alone. Here are five of our favorite stories spotlighting resilience, healing, and yes, hope, to help you face 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. \u2018Work with hope\u2019<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Face it, poet and classics scholar Rachel Hadas<\/a> writes<\/a>: \u201cWe\u2019re in a prolonged period of maddeningly, scarily bad news.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if you think that makes our society unique, think again. For as long as humans have been writing, they\u2019ve been facing crises, learning to adapt \u2013 more than we give our species credit for \u2013 and keeping hope afloat. And readers today can draw strength from yesterday\u2019s literature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether it\u2019s Homer\u2019s Greek epic \u201cThe Iliad\u201d or American poet Emily Dickinson, writing about resilience often shares key themes, Hadas says: learning to balance the present and the future, the big-picture horizon and the joy of small things along the way. Quoting the modern Greek poet George Seferis, she writes of the need to \u201cput to sea again with our broken oars.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Before healing, remembering<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The pandemic has robbed people not only of joy, but also of ways to process grief. As many people grasp \u201cevery opportunity to reconnect\u201d and find new normals, others are still mourning lost loved ones, especially if COVID-19 restrictions prevented the kinds of healing and commemoration families once took for granted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A<\/a>
People are grieving for those lost to COVID-19 in many different ways. Some are expressing their loss through art. Andrew Lichtenstein\/Corbis via Getty Images<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Eventually, as the pandemic ebbs, both groups can find happiness, but in different ways, writes David Sloane<\/a>, who studies commemoration and mourning practices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With normal healing interrupted, \u201ceveryday memorials<\/a>\u201d from flags and photographs to tattoos can help people \u201ctransition from the depths of the pandemic to the reopened society by offering ways for them to mourn and remember.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As we recover, joy and grief are often mixed together, he says, but don\u2019t let \u201csurvivor\u2019s guilt\u201d keep you from finding comfort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Lean in to rituals<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Across cultures, rituals can mark life milestones, strengthen social ties and even promote hygiene \u2013 such as Wudu<\/a>, ritual cleansing before prayers in Islam. Yet the pandemic has interrupted everyday rites like handshakes and hugs, not to mention once-in-a-lifetime events like weddings or bar mitzvahs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that presents an opportunity to adapt<\/a>, writes psychologist Cristine Legare<\/a>. People often rely on rituals to manage stress and exert control, which helps them deal with uncertainty \u2013 part of what\u2019s so overwhelming about the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere are good reasons people spend time, money and energy engaging in rituals in the face of COVID-19 restrictions,\u201d she writes. \u201cThey are essential to meeting our physical, social and psychological needs in the face of adversity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. Hope vs. optimism<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Hope isn\u2019t expecting good things, psychologist Jacqueline Mattis<\/a> clarifies: It\u2019s believing they\u2019re possible, and then creating paths to achieve them. In other words, having a plan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She offers five strategies to actively cultivate hope<\/a>: having goals, harnessing uncertainty, managing attention, seeking community and looking at evidence. Challenges like a global pandemic call for adapting, not giving up, and \u201cuncertainty is not reason for paralysis \u2013 it is a reason to hope,\u201d Mattis writes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHopeful people do not wish \u2013 they imagine and act,\u201d she writes, emphasizing the importance of acting in community. Research on anti-poverty activists<\/a>, for example, underscores that their relationships ignited their hope and conviction, giving them \u201ca sense of accountability, to recognize that their work mattered and that they were part of something bigger than themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Flow can arise when playing games or engaged in artistic pursuits, like writing, photography, sculpting and painting. Somyot Techapuwapat\/Moment via Getty Images<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

5. Get in the flow<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For people still crafting their 2022 resolutions, cognitive scientist Richard Huskey<\/a> has a suggestion: Add some flow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s on his own list, too. \u201cFlow,\u201d a term coined in the 1970s by psychologist Mih\u00e1ly Cs\u00edkszentmih\u00e1lyi, is that feeling of complete absorption, or intense concentration, when someone\u2019s thoughts \u201care focused on an experience rather than on themselves,\u201d Huskey explains<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Intrinsically rewarding experiences, like those that put us \u201cin the zone,\u201d support mental health, well-being and resilience. In fact, a study from China<\/a> shows that people with more \u201cflow\u201d in their lives \u201chad better well-being during the COVID-19 quarantine.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Editor\u2019s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation\u2019s archives.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Molly Jackson<\/a>, Religion and Ethics Editor, The Conversation<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Molly Jackson, The Conversation Six months ago, it was easy for many Americans to think COVID-19 was on the defensive. Vaccinations were ticking up as case numbers ticked down. Summer sunshine made hanging out outside actually enjoyable, after a cooped-up winter of socializing with just our pods. Maybe, just maybe, Zoom fatigue would soon be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":28429,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2450,38],"tags":[10750,7689,2275,5822,3807,4151,383,11160],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28428"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28428"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28428\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28431,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28428\/revisions\/28431"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}