Ripples of Hope
by Paul Wesselmann
A few years ago several of my friends were struggling mightily with some really big stuff that was going on in their lives. In my quest to help them regain and retain a sense of hope, I began gathering a collection
of useful nuggets of inspiration and information. I reviewed notes from previous talks I had given, scoured the weekly Ripples emails I sent out, and even dipped into the archives of my social media posts. I gave a few talks on the subject of hope, trying to compile the best of my hopeful content all in one place.
I even toyed with the idea of assembling a book, often twirling around in circles of insecurity, confusion and overwhelm, while occasionally making some progress toward organizing my thoughts. In the early days of 2020, I made a commitment to publish the content in some form by the end of the year.
Then, something really unexpected happened. We, and I mean the collective we of the entire world, faced an unprecedented, monumental challenge: COVID-19. What began as troubling news about a highly infectious disease in a faraway land morphed into a worldwide pandemic impacting how we worked and how we lived. We had to physically distance ourselves from each other while struggling with copious amounts of fear, frustration and uncertainty. It was a health-care crisis unlike anything most of us had ever seen or even imagined.
With the help of my partner and a handful of cherished friends and colleagues, we dived back into the content, ready to unleash the most helpful and most hopeful resource we could assemble in the shortest
amount of time. We hope you find some useful nuggets to raise your spirits today, and perhaps help you extend ripples of hope to others you know to be struggling.
Peace,
Paul