On the homepage of my website (of which this blog is a part) is the statement that jaded optimism lurks here. I’ve been thinking a lot about optimism and hope lately. Trying to change the way you think is difficult. Musing with my wife the other day I realized—and this should’ve been obvious—that my optimism became “jaded” when I lost my job at Nashotah House. You see, our lives have been uncertain since then. The steady income of an academic job with a retirement plan, a future mapped out (at least a little) with summers free for research and travel, the flexibility to have time to contemplate; all of this fits my neurodivergent way of thinking. Having suddenly to cope with finding an apartment, finding jobs (not vocations), losing retirement options, all of this has led to a turmoil that has lasted going on two decades now.
I need to challenge my jaded optimism into becoming real. I keep coming back to Mark 9.24, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.” I’m not a materialist, although academia led me close to it a time or two. The universe, however, is an untamed place. We don’t know the trillionth of it, let alone the half. We’ve figured out a good bit of the physics of this world and think that it applies the same everywhere in this infinite, expanding space-time. Then we discovered quantum physics and quantum entanglement which looks more like religion than science. It seems to me that optimism—hope—lies in a combination of what science tells us and what is traditionally called religion tells us. You may call it “belief,” “intuition,” or “hope.” Yes, when Pandora’s box was opened, only hope remained.
There’s a parable in the story of Pandora. As told by Hesiod, Pandora’s jar contained the gifts of the gods which escaped when Pandora opened it. Thereby evil entered the world. Yet one gift of the gods remained for humankind, and that was hope. Arguably the most valuable gift of them all. I have been letting my career malfunction at Nashotah House dominate and drive my outlook for far too long. It will never cease to hurt, I know, but it’s time I learned the meaning of what the Pandora myth teaches us. Myth, please understand, functions like religion. It provides insight and guidance. And the tale of Pandora, especially when things turn unexpectedly frightening, reminds us that hope is the only necessary gift of the gods.
