Oxthink

I may not have a magic lamp but I do have my own genie – of sorts. It’s my way of making good things happen.

Unfortunately, my genie does not grant me wishes. Our relationship isn’t quite as simple, as direct or as fulfilling as that. Rather than wishes, my genie operates on the basis of hopes. I put out the hopes; my genie chooses whether or not to confer them.

It is a practice that has on the whole served me reasonably well. This is because it recognises the difference between making a wish and having a hope. Wishes are dreamy desires; hopes tend to be more established – they are more likely to be based on steps having been made towards a desirable outcome.

“I wish I was an astronaut” as compared with “I hope my application to be an astronaut is successful.”

“I wish I was rich” as compared with “I hope my lottery ticket wins.”

I have much more confidence in my hopes being realised rather than my wishes coming true. And so it is to my hopes that I look to.

This is how it works. Essentially, my aim is to ensure that I am making proactive efforts to develop, progress or re-shape my life. To do this, I will always have something in place that I am hoping will happen. More than this – and this is the key element of my approach – I will always try to have three such hoped for prospects outstanding – three possibilities that might be realised.

As we know, in the granting of requests, all good genies work in three’s!

And practically, as the expression goes, it’s about having irons in the fire. My belief is that if I have three hopes outstanding I have a better chance of at least realising one of those hopes. I’m not relying on the one thing, a single hope.

I might apply for a new job; send a manuscript off to a publisher; buy a lottery ticket; make contact with a prospective romantic date; enter a prize competition; make a new investment; write a letter to or email an organisation with some ideas and suggestions.

Quite often, these hopes will be life-changing or at least life-enhancing. Should one of them come to fruition then it would make a dramatic and positive difference to my life. This means that there is always something to look forward to, some possibility that something might happen which will have a substantive effect on me. It means that I live an expectant life. I’m always expecting something good to happen; always anticipating that moment of genie magic.

I never know what the postman might deliver, who my next telephone call will be from or what my latest email might say.

Living with hope gives me a zest for life. Things are in place. I know that something good is going to happen. Change is just around the corner; promotion is only a step away; success is at hand.

This hopeful enthusiasm also drives my ambition. Sometimes I will push out more hopes. Rather than having just the three I might stretch my aims to five or even six. The more hopes that I have the more possibilities that I can realise.

It’s like a sales organisation pitching for business. The more quotes and tenders that they put out the more likely they are of getting an order.

In selecting potential hopes, I do try to be realistic and not overly ambitious. My hopes are always in reach, always realisable. There’s no reason why they could not happen. I also try to have a mix of hopes, with some being more likely than others. It means that even if my grandest aspirations are not being met I may still be rewarded with the attainment of some of my lesser hopes.

In pursuing this bullish approach, one observation that has become apparent to me is that –perhaps rather unsurprisingly – the more I invest in a hope the more likely that hope is of being realised. Hope rarely comes out of nothing. By making some effort I make the realisation of a hope much more possible. This may be because the more effort I make means that it is less for my genie to have to do.

My genie also tends to favour the granting of my less ambitious hopes, the ones that presumably require less work on its part!

Living in hope also has an agreeable side-effect. It produces a feel-good factor. The beauty of having a hope rather than making a wish is that I can take the credit for my successes. My genie may have conferred the hope but I will have put some of the effort in. I will have established the hope. I will have laid the groundwork. This is a great confidence booster. It makes me want to push more hopes out there.

Of course, things don’t always go to plan. But I can cope with that. When things don’t materialise as I would like them to, I quickly bounce back by adding new hopes. When one of my hopes falls away it is immediately replaced with a new one. And besides, if one hope falters I still have another two that are pending. This means that any failure is not so disheartening, not so impactful, not so devastating.

And so, I live in hope. I’m always giving hope a chance. Three hopes in fact. I trust that having put my hopes out there, my genie will favour one of them. After all, that’s what genies are supposed to do.