HOPE IS…

Illustration bentheillustrator.com

Hope isn’t soft.
It’s not blind optimism or empty affirmations.
It’s not polished, pretty, or pretending everything’s fine.
It also doesn’t sit around waiting for someone else to fix things.

Hope is messy. Loud. Emotionally charged.
It’s what keeps me going when everything else says give up.
When the system gaslights you into thinking you’re powerless.
When the rules make no sense and you’re told, that’s just how it is.
Oh hell to the no.

For me, hope is freedom.
It’s knowing I don’t have to accept what I was handed.
As a kid, I questioned everything. Still do.
I’ve never been great at following the rules or staying in my lane.
Not as a woman. Not as a creative. Not as someone who’s always felt like she didn’t quite fit the mould.

Hope is a door.
Not an exit. But a way through.

Even when things feel broken or impossible, we still get to do things differently.
We get to build something honest, gutsy, human and authentically ours.
We get to question the rules, flip the script, and imagine better ways of doing things.
We get to create spaces where people actually belong, build businesses that give a damn, and ideas that make space for everyone, not just the loudest, richest, or most artificially powerful.

I want to live in a world where people feel their worth.
Not because of what they achieve or produce, but because they exist and have every right to be here.

Where care isn’t treated like a bonus. It’s a basic human right.
Where systems aren’t just patched up to be more inclusive, but rebuilt with everyone in mind from the start.

Where identity isn’t a box to tick or something you have to soften to fit in.
Where every person; every race, gender, belief, background, feels wanted, welcomed, and free to be exactly who they are.
Where you’re backed for who you are and who you’re still becoming.

Where ageing doesn’t mean fading out.
It means stepping into something new.
A phase where you’re needed, celebrated, listened to, and never, ever invisible.

That’s the kind of future I want to help build.

Hope, for me, is being seen for all of who you are.
It’s being allowed to be uncertain and brilliant and scrappy and valuable all at once.
It’s starting something without knowing where it’ll end up, but doing it anyway.
It’s got that 90s DIY energy. Self-made. Self-sufficient. Driven by purpose.

I want women to feel seen.
To know they’re allowed to take up space, speak up, show up however they damn well please.
I want kids to feel excited about the future. To believe in all the possibilities waiting for them,
no matter their age, gender, religion, race or bank balance.

And I want everyone, of every generation, to feel like the future wants them in it.
Hope, to me, is making an exciting, fulfilling future possible. For everyone.

Hope isn’t the solution.
It’s the spark. The flame to the match.
The nudge. The push. The quiet refusal to settle.

And maybe most powerfully of all, it’s the belief that together, we can build something better than what we were given.

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