What Hope Means To Me Now And In The Past

Generally speaking, if you asked me what my opinion of the word “Hope” was about five years ago, I would not have an answer that is like my answer for you today. My life has always been trying to look for hope, but it is quite sad it had to be until senior year that the word hope had become an actual possibility. Most people think that the word hope could relate to being able to find a solution to a problem, and that is how I feel today.

The Merriam Webster dictionary explains that hope means that you wish for something to happen, and you have an expectation for that thing to happen. Moreover, my coach always said in eighth grade I was a very optimistic person (often times because we were horrible at basketball) but after the sophomore year I never really had much optimism because of what had happened in high school. Just take a journey with me and see if I can explain in my own words what my own definition of hope can quite possibly be for now.

For one thing, during my junior year, I didn’t even think hope was an actual option. I will explain why because I feel like I need to show people that hope is possible, even for a guy like me. I had been bullied ever since elementary school, and transferred from the public school system to a private school system. The bullying went away for a couple years until seventh grade when it started again. I had a classmate who would make fun of my weight, lifestyle, or even the decisions I made. He made my self-esteem go pretty low and I still have a low self esteem issue. When I look at it now, I feel like he taught me how to be a tougher person and it was just a life experience.

Eighth grade was one of the calmest moments of my life, as I had nothing to worry about until the end of the year. My friend had decided to transfer to the public school system because he wanted to try out new things. His leaving had an effect on me because we would not be so close anymore. We haven't really talked since, and now we are not considered friends anymore. He was always there for me, and I feel like it was another stepping stone to growing up. I needed to realize that people will not always be there for me when I am older and so I will need to find other people to talk to. It related to almost like in the film Stand By Me, “I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?”Ninth grade had been kind of a turning point because during basketball season, I had met a group of guys from a school in Shiawassee county. My coach, Dan Thelen, brought me in. I tried shooting the ball, and the other team even helped me score. It was my friend Sam who gave me the buzzer beating shot (we lost). In tenth grade, they had thought I wasn't important anymore and decided to ignore me and not talk to me anymore. I was even belittled and mocked at during sporting events. It really caused my depression, and I remember someone telling me that I was not wanted at that school anymore. When I was recovering, I had became close friends with a couple of different people from the same school and the past is history; it was ironic actually.

Throughout the years, I had personally grown up as a person but I still remember the suffering I had encountered through the depression. They make me stronger as a person and I can personally look to the future for improvement very much. Maybe I was bullied for a good thing, and that they wanted to teach me how to become a better person and learn how to be a mature human being. Sometimes people think that they are going through a tough time because God is preparing us for what is to come ahead. I think that is a good idea to think because some people are going through a good life and they have no worries, and some people are just thinking that life is tough and nothing is going to get better. Personally, I think I'm in the middle because sometimes I realize that I have a good life and I shouldn't worry much, and sometimes I feel like I have a bad life and I need to worry more. Like one of my old friends always told me, God always gives his toughest battles to his toughest soldiers.