As we say goodbye to more people lost to transphobic violence, I listen to a speaker filled with fight. They declare: “together we will turn the tides of hate.” It’s 2°C outside, but I feel warm.
I wanted to talk a little bit about hope. That warm feeling you get when something might actually go your way. That drive inside you telling you that something has to work, or it will all be for nothing. Hope is positive, thrilling even, and is essential to our very existence.
We hear, read and talk a lot about the turmoil in the world. Conflicts, climate change and the ruling class’s actions all feature heavily and often in our daily lives. I’ve lost sleep over them all many times, thinking, “it’s all going to shit, is it really worth it?” And yet, I eventually fall asleep, wake up the next day and continue on. Maybe it’s the resistance in me, but I’m warming up to the idea that it may in fact be hope that spurs me to act.
I write this not to say that I am doing grand things to solve the world’s problems. Some may argue that I enable the problems that exist today. By buying the wrong things, working for the wrong organisations or not shouting loud enough when a new tragedy is reported, I perpetuate systems that do people harm. I recognise this and yet I believe I am trying to live an important life. I am important to me and the people around me and I hope (there’s that word again) what I do affects people beyond my own little sphere.
If we take away the daily worries of food, safety, comfort and money, I am still motivated to get up and do something with my day. My motivation fluctuates everyday just like everyone else’s, but even after I’ve been lying in bed with existential dread for hours, there’s that tiny bit of hope that maybe today will be ok. I hope that today will be worth it so that my life as a whole can be important. And that’s all I need to keep going.
There is always hope
For the rest of this post, I could link these very individual experiences to those of millions or even billions of people that are moved by hope to effect change in their lives and the systems they find themselves in. I could reel off example after example of groups succeeding against the odds and what that does to our brains as participants and onlookers. That would be a very long blog post and one I’m not qualified to write.
What I do want to use this post for is to remind you that there is always hope. We are a hopeful species, and no one can take that away from us. We need to grow that hope for now and for the future, and that’s what I hope to do with my words on this blog. Whether that be through imagining fictional futures or reflecting on real-world acts of ingenuity, I intend to spark new ideas on what we can contribute to the people and places around us. This aim, in my view, is inherently solarpunk.
I’ve called this blog Solarpunk Soul for now as I always try to look on the sunny side of life. The definitions of solarpunk are broad and varied, but I think a common theme of each is the imagination of a nature-positive future grounded in technologies and communities that resist the status quo of today. Indeed, I hope to build a much less wordy definition of my own as my blog matures (or festers, whichever you prefer). One thing is for sure, this blog is built on a lot of hope.
I intend my next post to be a little more self-centred, a proper contextual introduction to what makes me “me” and why I think I can help others expand their mental and technological horizons. If I’ve intrigued you enough, please do consider subscribing. This is a new passion project and I don’t intend to write to any particular schedule, so I can promise you’ll be free of marketing spam.