Hope

HOPE - Simple four letter word.  It can be powerfully heartening or an equally powerful self-destructive choice.  Definitions: Hope is the belief in a positive outcome; false hope refers to hope based entirely on a fantasy or an extremely unlikely outcome.
We all want the optimist, the hopeful, the positive outlook, the half-full glass.  Then there is the destructive potential of "false hope".  This is the stubborn, ill-advised, ill-informed, ostrich-like belief in life's Hail Mary passes.
But what turns hope destructive is just not whether the object of it is high or low probability.  It is not destructive to hope that our lottery ticket is a winner; it is not destructive for the family of a Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) survivor to hope for a healthy heart and brain - low probability to be sure, but not inherently dangerous.
I think it is how much we choose to invest of ourselves in the low probability outcomes that can turn hope into self-destruction.  The ruin of dashed dreams that never should have been dreamt.  It is when we count on it, bank on it, base decisions on it.  With that lottery ticket - hoping it is a winner is one thing, planning a vacation with the winnings starts to look foolhardy, buying the first-class plane tickets in anticipation of it is the self-destructive leap.
In our relationships, the line can be hard to see; love muddies and fogs the boundary.  Can we tell when hope is a positive power and when is it bound to crash, crush, disappoint and destroy?  With our loved ones, if there is financial distress, we hope there are prudent choices; if there is addiction, we hope there is a turn towards sobriety.  But we need to watch our toes on that fuzzy, foggy line --- buying the emotional equivalent of the first-class tickets is a wickedly dangerous choice.