A Very Long Engagement

What does it take to be hopeful? Hope is an everyday human experience that is so ruthlessly clichéd. Such word has been sorely worn out that, to a mere mortal like me, arriving at its essence is such a hopeless plight. I take Marion’s explanation of how hope is distinctive from mere calculation of possibility, expectation, optimism, vitality and stoicism then later attempt to understand how hope can lead to transfiguration.
According to Marion, hope is always directed towards the future, making it temporal. The temporality of hope helps us distinguish it from mere calculation of probabilities. Having to expect that something will actually happen and knowing it will happen is distinctive from hoping. Just like when I tell my sister to open the door and she says yes. Even if I want her to open the door for me, I am not hoping for her to open the door but instead I am expecting her to open it. Hope is also different from optimism. Optimism is when someone has a positive outlook in life that things will just turn out for the best. He does not plunge himself into the experience but instead makes speeches that addresses as if from a distant view. It focuses Hope is not vitality either. Vitality is related to having a healthy body, however, hope should never be linked to any physical theory but instead a spiritual principle. Neither it is stoicism since a stoic is always imprisoned within oneself. A stoic claims no responsibility towards anyone aside from himself.
Hope is more than just acceptance of the situation you are in, but in some way a non-acceptance as well. Hope is accepting the fact that you are in a situation wherein you have no control of. It is the experience of humbling oneself and acknowledging one’s own limitations, entrusting all burden to a higher being. It goes hand in hand with uncertainty that comes along with fear. However the fact that hope is dialogical, it makes it a joint action of the I and the Other. Consequently, the fact that it is