11. Afraid To Hope Again

Have you ever found yourself afraid to get your hopes up? Keeping your expectations low, preparing for disappointment, or waiting for something to go wrong?

This week we're reflecting on the fear that often hides beneath self-protection—and the surprising ways God meets us when we've become afraid to hope again.

In this episode, we'll explore:

• Why fear sometimes looks like caution rather than panic
• The difference between wisdom and self-protection
• What disappointment teaches us to do with hope
• The question hiding beneath "Let's wait and see
• Why the things we protect most carefully often matter most
• What God may be revealing through our longing

Links + Resources From This Episode:

• Get the monthly letter
• Find me on Instagram @denisa.o.nica
• Download a transcript of this, and every episode at www.denisaonica.com

Find Denisa Elsewhere:

• Leave a review on Apple Podcasts
• Join Denisa's Substack
• Order my book  Kairos, When The Holy Meets The Daily
• Start with a 21-day Guest Seat at The Table

Episode Website 

Transcript

Speaker 0:00

I'm Denisa Nica, and welcome to Walking Anyway.

Speaker 0:04

You're listening to episode 11. This is a podcast about living faithfully in uncertain seasons when life feels unclear and nothing is quite settling yet. If this is your first time listening in, this is a place for anyone carrying questions of any kind and for any reason, and is not quite sure how to move through this in a way that feels steady and true. If this is your experience, you're in the right place to keep walking anyway.

Speaker 0:36

Each week I offer a reflection and a simple way to faithfully walk one more step. I'm an author and spiritual director and the founder of The Table, a contemplative space shaped by a weekly rhythm where women practice this kind of faithful living together at their own pace in the middle of their real lives and faith.

Speaker 0:56

I live in Spain where life moves a little slower, and that has changed the way I pay attention and the way I live inside my own life.

Speaker 1:06

This week I'm reflecting on fear, longing, and something that has been becoming important in my own formation. The surprising ways God keeps inviting us back to the things that still matter to us. Listen in. Early last week, my husband Daniel and I were walking along the beach near our home. These days we tend to go later in the evening because it's simply too warm during the day. By 10 o'clock, the air has finally softened enough to be outside comfortably, and the beach feels different then. It's quieter, slower, almost like the whole place has exhaled. The sky was that deep violet blue color that appears just before darkness settles in. The water was calm. Small waves rolled toward the shore and disappeared around our feet as we walked. And the air smelled faintly of salt and summer and traces of sunscreen left behind after a long day at the beach. We were talking about ordinary things at first. Something he read and a couple of things that had happened during the day.

Speaker 2:13

Then Daniel mentioned a conversation he'd had with a friend, which led to another conversation, and before long we found ourselves talking about the fall. A few things that might be coming up later this year. Some possibilities, some plans, things we were looking forward to. And somewhere in the middle of that conversation, I noticed something shift inside me. Until that point, I had felt relaxed and present. But as we talked, I could feel myself becoming a little careful. Not anxious exactly, just careful. I started qualifying things in my mind. We'll see. Maybe a lot can happen between now and then. Let's not get ahead of ourselves. None of those thoughts were especially unusual. In fact, if you've lived any amount of life, they probably sound familiar. They sounded familiar to me too. But as we kept walking, I found myself paying attention to them because they arrived so quickly, almost automatically. As if some part of me had already learned exactly what to do whenever something good appeared on the horizon. And that's what caught my attention. Not the thoughts themselves, but the speed of them, how quickly I moved away from anticipation and toward caution, as if looking forward to something had somehow become riskier than preparing for disappointment.

Speaker 3:43

And I think that's when I realized I wasn't really protecting myself from uncertainty. I was protecting myself from disappointment. The truth is, I could probably give you half a dozen examples from the last few months. That walk on the beach just happens to be the most recent one. I don't think I would have probably noticed any of this a few years ago. I think I would have called it realism. Maybe I would have said I was being practical and managing expectations. Maybe I would have even called it wisdom. Now the tricky thing about this kind of self-protection is that it rarely announces itself. It feels responsible and measured and it feels like evidence that you've learned something from your life. And maybe you have. Maybe that's why this feels so difficult to talk about. Because there is a difference between wisdom and self-protection. But sometimes they wear very similar clothes. I don't know exactly when I became the person who says, let's wait and see. I just know that somewhere along the way, anticipation started being followed very quickly by caution. Something good would come into view, and almost immediately another part of me would step in and say, Don't get carried away. A lot can happen between now and then.

Speaker 5:07

And the more I sat with it, the more I realized I didn't want to criticize that cautious part of myself. Because honestly, it's helped me. It's protected me and got me through some things. Fear has been a pretty loyal companion at different times in my life. There were seasons when being careful made sense and when preparing for disappointment felt safer than trusting hope. Seasons when keeping one eye out on what could go wrong felt like the most responsible way to move through the world.

Speaker 5:41

Maybe that's true for you too. The problem isn't that fear showed up. The problem is that sometimes fear stays long after the danger has passed. And after a while, we stop noticing how much space it occupies. We stop noticing how often it gets the first and maybe even the last word. Maybe that's why I recognize this so quickly. It's been one of those years when disappointment has been close enough to touch. The kind of year that teaches you things and that makes self-protection feel reasonable. And it's a tender conversation because eventually the question stops being what if it doesn't work out? And becomes, what if I let myself want it again? What if I let myself look forward to it? What if I let myself imagine that something good might happen? What if I let myself hope? And then the earth buckles anyway. I think that's the question I was brushing up against on the beach. Not whether the future was uncertain. I mean the future has always been uncertain. What felt vulnerable was hope itself. What felt vulnerable was wanting something, because wanting something means it matters. And when something matters, it can hurt. I don't think we talk about this very much. At least I don't. It's easier to talk about fear and certainty. It's actually easier to talk about courage. But hope feels different. Hope asks something of us. Not because it guarantees anything, but I think because it requires openness. And openness is difficult when you've spent years learning how to protect yourself. I wonder if that's why some of us feel tired around hope.

Speaker 7:43

Hope can feel expensive. I don't think we've stopped wanting things or that we've become cynical. But hoping asks us to become vulnerable again, to loosen our grip a little and to stop rehearsing disappointment long enough to imagine another possibility. One of the reasons I've been thinking about the resurrection stories lately is that nobody in those stories seems especially certain. We often remember Easter from the other side because we know how the story ends. They didn't. They were grieving, confused, trying to make sense of something they couldn't yet understand. And still they kept moving toward Jesus. They didn't move toward what they knew for sure. They moved toward him. That's the part that stays with me. The willingness to keep showing up before everything made sense. Back to our walk on the beach that evening, the thing that surprised me wasn't that I felt cautious.

Speaker 8:52

What surprised me was realizing that underneath all that caution, part of me still wanted something. Part of me was still hoping. And maybe that's why the caution showed up in the first place. And I wonder if that's what we misunderstand about ourselves sometimes. Maybe the caution isn't evidence that hope has disappeared. Maybe the caution is evidence that hope is still there. Because if we truly didn't care, there would be nothing to protect. If we had stopped wanting something altogether, there would be no reason to brace. If the longing had disappeared, there would be no reason to manage expectations. The caution only shows up because something still matters. Something is still alive and reaching toward the future. A few days after that walk, I found myself sitting with a notebook and a cup of coffee. I wasn't preparing for this episode, but without really planning to, I wrote these three words at the top of the page. I still hope. Then I stared at them for a while. Nothing happened at first. Then eventually something did come to mind, something I hadn't admitted to myself in a while. And it struck me how quickly another part of me wanted to explain it away, to minimize it, or to tell me not to get my hopes out.

Speaker 10:20

And that's when I realized this unconventional practice wasn't really about the answer. It was about noticing what happened next. So if you have a notebook nearby sometime this week, even the back of an envelope, maybe you could try the same thing. Just write, I still hope. And see what comes. Not what should come or what sounds spiritual or mature, just what comes. The truth is, I still don't know what will happen with the things my husband and I were talking about that evening on the beach. I don't know what the fall will bring and which plans will come together and which ones won't. The future is every bit as uncertain today as it was that night. But when I think back to that walk, what stays with me isn't the uncertainty or the fact that we were talking about the future at all. It's the fact that part of me still longed for something, was still looking ahead and imagining what might be possible. The waves were still coming in that evening. The sky was getting darker, nothing had been decided or guaranteed. And we kept walking toward the car talking about possibilities and about things we hoped might happen. And when I think about that evening now, what I remember the most is the longing I felt. Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.

Speaker 11:53

Maybe the invitation today isn't to become more optimistic, but simply to become honest, to bring our hopes into the light and place them gently before our friend Jesus, and to trust that he's present with us there. And perhaps that's enough for now.

Speaker 12:12

May we be brave enough to name and tell the truth about what we still hope for. And may we receive today's light without demanding tomorrow's guarantees.

Speaker 12:24

Thanks for listening to episode 11 of Walking Anyway. I hope this practice of looking beneath the bracing helps you discover what God has been preserving through the fear and helps you keep walking anyway. Because the way you're walking through this is already forming something steady in you.

Speaker 12:46

And if you'd like to continue the conversation, I'd love to invite you to my monthly letters.

Speaker 12:52

They're a quiet place where I share reflections on faith, ordinary life, and what it means to be human in a world that often asks us to move faster than ourselves can keep up. I'll add the link in the show notes.

Speaker 13:07

If this episode resonated with you, you can follow the show wherever you listen to the podcast. And if you'll be willing to leave a review or reading, we'll help some more people to screw like anyway and join us here. And if someone leave the money for listening today, maybe send this episode to them.

Speaker 13:27

As always, you can find me at denisaonica.com or on Instagram at denisa.o.nica. I'd love to see you there. As you step back into your day, notice what stayed with you, and let that be enough for today. Just like light moving through a room. You don't need to see everything at once to keep living faithfully here.

Speaker 13:48

I'll close with one last blessing this time from John O'Donohue: "May you have the courage to leave the life that is waiting for you."

Speaker 13:57 Speaker 13:58

Thanks for listening, and I'll be here with you next time.