"Hope is the pillar of the world" is a profound Nigerian proverb. Hope is a wish, a dream, an expectation of a time to come. The way we convey our sense of hope to ourselves and to each other is through stories. We hope to grow old and healthy and famous. We hope to continue making money sustainably. We hope we'll come out of recession. All are reasonable hopes. The things we do and the stories we tell have a lot to do with maintaining our sense of hopefulness. And this sense of hopefulness is recognised by our employees, our customers and stakeholders and reflects in our life circumstances.

So what hopeful stories do you think/talk to yourself? What stories do you tell your stakeholders, colleagues, employees and customers? How do you tell them? Are they consistent and believeable? In amongst all the stories that continually circulate in the world, why would they pay attention to your story? How do you know your stories are working?

The interesting idea about thoughts of hope is that it is impossible to engage them without also thinking about its opposites; fears, limitations, self-limiting beliefs and risks. How do you tell these stories? What metaphors are you using? How can they be changed?

Steve Banhegyi
steve@storytelling.co.za
www.storytelling.co.za