Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings, when the dawn is still dark and the night lingers on. —Rabindranath Tagore
I’m in a lab waiting room.
White walls, vinyl chairs, antiseptic air.
I share my journal with a stranger,
a lovely older man, eyes soft, voice clear.
I read:
We can never fully understand why things happen.
Things happen for reasons beyond our grasp—
reasons maybe unique to our soul’s code.
Fear will eat our lifetime in advance.
But if we trust, just enough,
we might relax…
and feel the healing power of hope.
He sits in silence.
Then he asked—
“Is it possible… your unwavering optimism
might give someone false hope?”
False Hope?
They call it belief in outcomes
no one can promise.
But isn’t all hope
an unreasonable act—
to choose possibility
before the proof arrives?
Still I wonder…
Is it right to hold onto the dawn
when another stands closer to the night:
Does my stubborn light
Dishonor their dark?
But I have known teachers.
Compassionate, fierce, radiant beings
who planted seeds that cracked my despair wide open.
”Faith is loyalty to the unseen reality.”
”Each of us has a unique part to play in the healing of the world.”
”Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it.”
These were not false gifts.
They changed my cells.
They lifted me from despair’s dirty bed.
They passed the baton.
And I ran.
See, this isn’t a solo race.
It’s a relay.
We run for each other.
With each other.
And the finish line?
It’s not always survival.
Sometimes it’s peace.
Sometimes it’s one more moment
wrapped in love.
I’ve learned to shift the lens—
Not to deny the challenge
But to deny its dominion.
That subtle, powerful pivot
Opens doors.
And I’ve learned this too—
We cannot know the best outcome.
We want healing to look one way,
but life may be weaving something greater,
unseen.
Our task is not to control the ending—
Our task is to stand in trust,
to let the highest outcome reveal itself.
Still—
some days break you.
Like the day I sat with my mother—
her last room,
her last bed,
her last view out the window.
The doctor said gently,
“We don’t want to offer false hope. She will not be home again.”
False hope?
What a phrase.
What a theft.
Her body failing,
my strength failing.
I tried to breathe life into her with my gaze.
But then—
a squeeze of my hand.
So slight.
So sacred.
And I knew—
hope hadn’t left.
Hope was right there
riding the wave of her final breath.
And when the spectacular dawn finally came,
I knew she was home.
Home in the light.
Hope lives
until the very end.
And beyond.
It travels with the soul,
in every sigh,
every prayer,
every quiet letting go.
Hopelessness is a lie.
I choose to trust.
To pass the baton.
To surrender to the dawn
I cannot yet see.
Herein lies the peace of God.
