Living without passion, positive expectations or enthusiasm can become painful. But feeling hopeless doesn’t have to be permanent. Feeling hopeless may be a natural, universal response to personal and world events that impact our lives. Some experts propose there’s more than one form of hopelessness and learning which type you’re living with may help you face the challenge and overcome those feelings.
Hope is associated with fulfilment of needs
These vital needs are:
Attachment: a hope for physical proximity, intimacy and emotional bonding and spiritual unity
Mastery: a hope for productivity and accomplishments
Survival: a hope for overcoming physical challenges, anxiety, loss, and fear and building resiliency
If these needs are fulfilled, we tell ourselves everything’s well in those areas and we act from those assumptions.
Attachment: “The Universe is kind and open; I’m connected.”
Mastery: “Help is available; I’m empowered; I can rely on collaboration.”
Survival: “Protection is obtainable; I’m safe and I can rely on myself.”
When these needs are compromised during our development, though, we may start feeling hopeless.
Nine forms of hopelessness
Nine types of hopelessness can be grouped into three categories:
alienation, forsakenness, and lack of inspiration
doom, helplessness, and captivity
powerlessness, oppression, and limitedness
The key to overcoming these types of hopelessness is to reframe or re-evaluate those cognitive distortions. In other words, to regain hope we must try to think about our thoughts and how we can change them to see things differently.
Here are the nine forms of hopelessness:
1. Alienation (attachment hopes)
This type of hopelessness comes from feeling others have forgotten about you or don’t include you as a peer. You feel different in some way, and bonding with others is a challenge because of these differences. Because you feel hopeless about bonding with others, you may persistently reject and avoid them first.
2. Forsakenness (attachment and survival hopes)
Hopelessness in this case comes from feeling others have abandoned you when you needed them the most. You may feel rejected or stigmatized as well, and this leads you to distrust others and your surroundings.
3. Lack of inspiration (attachment and mastery hopes)
When you don’t feel mentally stimulated or creative, you may develop this type of hopelessness. You may feel blocked or unable to be creative in some or all aspects of your life.
4. Powerlessness (mastery hopes)
Feeling you and your actions have no influence or impact on others or the world may lead you to feel hopeless. You may feel you’re devoid of strength or authority to make decisions or to effect change and depend on what others decide or do.
5. Oppression (attachment and mastery hopes)
This type of hopelessness is associated with a feeling of not being treated fairly or equally, particularly at a macro level. Systemic and persistent racism or sexism, for example, could lead to oppression hopelessness.
6. Limitedness (mastery and survival hopes)
You may feel as though you don’t have enough resources or skills to achieve your goals, or you’re facing physical or financial restraints to do so.
7. Doom (survival hopes)
This form of hopelessness has to do with feeling condemned to a certain negative outcome in life. This despair may come from early events in your life or from facing chronic or terminal illnesses.
8. Captivity (survival and attachment hopes)
You may face this type of hopelessness if you’ve been a physical prisoner at some point in your life or if you’ve been in an abusive relationship that made you feel you weren’t free to act or do as you wish.
It’s also possible to develop this emotion if you feel you stayed in harm’s way or allowed others to mistreat you because you felt that you deserved it.
9. Helplessness (survival and mastery hopes)
Feeling you’re unable to stand up for yourself or act without someone’s help may result in this form of hopelessness.
