Perceptions and Hope

Perceptions are really useful in giving you the motivation to step it up. There's nothing like hearing a close friend's perception of yourself and seeing how close or far away they are from the truth. It's always a humbling but good experience cause you realize that you need to step it up and live up to those perceptions, that you could be like how they see you. And if people have false, low perceptions of you-still works, it can give you the motivation to prove them wrong etc.

I just realized that in certain areas of my life I had less hope than in others. For some reason it was a lot easier to be hopeful on the mission which is ironic because statistically I didn't have much reason to be, but it's just a matter of being conscious of it and making a decision. Hope is something that has become more and more interesting to me...at first it seems (especially from a secular point of view) like such a fluffy last resort-no supstance, just something you have to do when there's nothing left to do, when really it will make everything work out so much easier when it's had from the beginning. But really, Hope is the ultimate test-i mean it's linked pretty closely with faith but it's really such an act of trust in something greater despite what outward circumstances are suggesting. The irony, if you can call it that, is that not only does it secure future blessings by having it-which is what you're hoping for in the first place, it makes the present more enjoyable as well...it just makes everthing better, if you have the eyes to see it like that. Obviously not everyone has the eyes to see the realities of hope...
is this making any sense? "no, but that's pretty normal after a head trauma."