When things feel bleak, the instinct is often to wait. To wait for the mood to lift, for circumstances to turn, for some piece of good news to arrive and make us feel better. Barack Obama suggests we have it backwards. The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something, he said. Don't wait for good things to happen to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope. It's a simple idea with a clever twist tucked inside it. We tend to assume hope comes first and action follows, that we'll get moving once we feel hopeful again. Obama flips the order around. Action comes first. Do something good, however small, and the hope shows up afterwards, in you and in the world around you.
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