Dr Suzy Green & Associates

Merry Christmas! Yes, can you believe it’s that time of year again?  How quickly time flies!  As you wind down for the holidays, it’s a perfect time to reflect on, and review the past year. Pull out your goals list or journals and see just how much you’ve achieved or learned this year.  Acknowledging success helps build competence and confidence to set even greater stretch goals in the future.  Christmas get-togethers are also an ideal time to share and celebrate success. Encourage your family and friends to name their top 5 achievements for the year or perhaps consider an annual pre-Christmas mini-break with a good buddy to ease into the silly season (think a Christmas shopping weekend in Melbourne or a golf weekend at the Hunter Valley!).  Make this time for your yearly review, with champagne on hand for celebration! 

December is also a wonderful time to cultivate gratitude for all that you’ve experienced and received throughout the year (particularly as in Australia, we don’t have a dedicated day for doing so ie Thanksgiving Day!  Even if you’ve had an “Annus Horribilis” in 08 and have experienced loss or adversity, there is still often much to express gratitude for, despite such experiences eg the support of family and friends.

In writing the last e-news for the year, I’m also aware of my own successes and challenges throughout the year and particularly grateful for the joy I receive in doing work I love.  As they say though, “change is the only constant” and so next year while I’ll continue to write the monthly e-news they’ll be brought to you by the “Positive Psychology Institute”!  My partner in crime, Paula Robinson, and I are madly setting up new offices in the St James Trust Building, 185 Elizabeth Street in the Sydney CBD – right above the divine “Bambini Trust Café and Wine Bar” – and will provide positive psychology consultation to individuals, groups and organizations.  Stay tuned, more info to come in January 09!

Last month I continued my discussion on the concept of PsyCap or Psychological Capital (Luthans et al, 2007).  This month I’ll be discussing the benefits of Hope, one key component of PsyCap.

Month 12 - 2008 - Building PsyCap: Becoming a High Hoper

When you think of hope, you probably think of something intangible that’s hard to define.  Yet hope is something we’ve all experienced at some point in our lives.  We hope for happiness, laughter, love and a long and healthy life.  We hope our children are everything we ever hoped they could be.  We hope that we’re smart enough to take quick enough action to ensure we have a planet for future generations!  Overall, we’re a pretty hopeful bunch!  And as the saying goes “while there’s life, there’s hope”!

Barack Obama also drew on the inspiration of hope in his presidential acceptance speech – “Hope – Hope in the face of difficulty. Hope in the face of uncertainty. The audacity of hope! In the end, that is God’s greatest gift to us, the bedrock of this nation. A belief in things not seen. A belief that there are better days ahead.
While there are many definitions of hope, it generally refers to a general feeling that some desire will be fulfilled.  In searching for quotes on hope for this month’s e-news I was interested to see that there were quotes on the benefits of being hopeful and quotes warning against hope!  For example, Nietzsche suggested “Hope is the worst of evil, for it prolongs the torments of man” and Benjamin Franklin also claimed “He that lives upon hope will die fasting”.  So, what do we know of hope, psychologically speaking, and is it worth cultivating or not?

A well-known Positive Psychologist, C.R. Snyder (1944-2006) dedicated most of his academic career to studying hope as a psychological construct and developed “Hope Theory”.  This theory emphasises goal-directed thinking in which an individual utilizes both pathways thinking (the perceived capacity to find routes to desired goals) and agency thinking (the beliefs in one’s capacities to use those routes)(Snyder & Lopez, 2007).

Snyder’s research also discovered that there tended to be two types of people when it comes to hope:  1) the High Hopers and; 2) the Low Hopers!  The High Hopers set goals, have high belief in their ability to achieve their goals and clearly articulate a number of pathways to reach those goals often at the onset of goal pursuit.  Whereas Low Hopers don’t tend to set goals, have low belief in their capabilities to achieve them and usually only identify one pathway to their goals and if it gets blocked – they give up!  Snyder’s research confirmed again and again, that High Hopers do better in every outcome - from the sports field and academic performance to health and happiness!  Recent research has also confirmed a relationship between hope and workplace performance (Adams et al, 2003). 

You can take a measure of your trait levels of Hope at the University of Pennsylvania Positive Psychology Center (http://www.ppc.sas.upenn.edu/ppquestionnaires.htm).  Whilst there is no definitive scoring to this measure, it will give you a general idea of whether you’re high or low on hope.

Don’t worry if you think you’re a Low Hoper.  The good news is that it can be developed.  My own research studies have provided evidence that hope can be developed over time through an evidence-based coaching intervention (Green, Oades & Grant, 2006, Green, Grant & Rynsaardt, 2007).  Even better news, you don’t have to have a personal coach to increase your levels of hope, there are some simple strategies below you can start to implement straight away.

This Month’s Action Plan – Finding the Will and the Way!

1. Set goals – I’ll be encouraging you in January 2009 to do this, with some tips on how to enhance your chances of success.  In preparation, take some time out over the holidays to start to formulate a list of goals you’d like to achieve in 09 and also spend some time revising your “fuzzy vision” (ie your longer term goals) and consider how your shorter term goals are aligned to these.  Our goals need to be aligned to both our values and our vision for success! (see Feb07 e-news on my website).
   
   
2. Be solution focused!  When you have identified your goals, write each one down on a separate page.  Spend 5 minutes brainstorming potential pathways, solutions or strategies to help you reach this goal.  Be creative and think outside the square!  Have at least 3 plans you could carry out to help you be successful.
   
   
3. Watch the ANTS! (see Jul07 e-news on my website).  Yes ANTS (automatic negative thoughts) are the most significant obstacles to goal success.  Low Hopers tend to have lots of ANTS when it comes to their goals eg I’ll never be able to do that!  How could that possibly happen for me?  The High Hopers are able to challenge these ANTS successfully and spend most of their time focusing on the evidence that they can reach their goals eg I can do it!  Write down 5 reasons why you could attain your goal – look for evidence from your past when you’ve overcome adversity or reached a stretch goal!  Keep reminding yourself of this!

So, in conclusion, you may still be wondering, as am I, about the quotes warning against hope?  I guess they have to do with having “false hope” ie hope where reality suggests the outcome is unlikely?  I would suggest though, that while in some cases, this might be relevant, in many cases, people are only limited by their own beliefs rather than perceived realities about what’s possible!  It’s also important to not be overly attached to your goals.  This means learning to put them out there but also understanding that you may not have 100% control over the outcome.  So if your goal pursuit is being blocked by external forces, then you need to “disengage” and transfer your energies onto another goal – which is exactly what the High Hopers do! 

Next Month…Developing the “B” Factor – stay tuned ……..

Hope is the thing with feathers in it that perches in the soul
Emily Dickinson