Hope

Hope is usually seen as critical for recovery, but it doesn’t just arrive by itself. This research describes how people with lived experience are active in finding and maintaining their hope.

Yeung, W. S., Hancock, N., Honey, A., Wells, K., & Scanlan, J. N. (early online). Igniting and Maintaining Hope: The Voices of People Living with Mental Illness. Community Mental Health Journal. doi:10.1007/s10597-020-00557-z

People with lived experience of mental illness have said that hope is critical to their ability to recover and lead a meaningful and satisfying life. Hope is expecting and believing that the future holds good things that you value.  It has also been described as reawakening after despair or believing change is possible.

Honours student Angela Yeung, under the supervision of a research team including Lived Experience researcher, Karen Wells, asked 74 people living with mental illness to write about an experience that had helped them to feel hopeful.

The authors thought that the findings showed that people with lived experience of mental illness have a critical role to play in inspiring hope in others. This is through being a role model, sharing stories of recovery, being part of an accepting community, and sharing information and strategies. Other people are also important, and it is important for consumers to try to spend time with people who care for them, respect them and believe in their ability to recover.

But hope is not just given by other people – people were active in finding hope for themselves. They used activities, strategies and environments that were uniquely meaningful to them to ignite their hope and they sought out people who would help them to maintain their hope.

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