When You Know What You Have To Do: Entering A New Year With Hope

I have always been moved by the opening two lines of Mary Oliver’s poem, ‘The Journey’:

‘One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began….’

It seems to me that life often presents itself as a series of conundrums, or questions, sometimes interlocking, and sometimes only tenuously linked, if indeed at all. When we are absolutely sure of something, then we may very well have missed the point of the question we are being asked.

And so, to travel through life without certainty is a very honest response to a world that is, semper mutabilis - constantly in flux - and from which we are continuingly learning. In that sense, I have always admired people who, when asked a question, simply respond. ‘I don’t know’.

As I have grown older the certainties I held as a younger man have all but evaporated into the ether. Whilst that reality initially unsettled me, I now find myself glad that certitude is more of a stranger than a companion.

That said, I continue to question almost everything, but I live those questions now, that is, they are almost never purely academic; they matter because they are applicable to everyday life.

As we approach the new dawn of 2026, the concept of hope is very much at the forefront of my mind. Quite why this is, I do not know. Perhaps it is because 2025 was so very difficult? That the forthcoming year could hardly be more challenging is a thought that, at least to some degree, sustains me.

The niggling doubt I have, however, is that this rationale is much more negative than it is positive, and that does not sit easily with me. I have always been orientated towards a hope that is not contingent on circumstance but is borne from within.

But how is that ‘lived’? I find myself drawn to the profound reflection of Václav Havel, the Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright, and dissident. Rebecca Solnit’s 'Hope in the Dark' cites Havel thus:

‘The kind of hope I often think about (especially in situations that are particularly hopeless, such as prison) I understand above all as a state of mind, not a state of the world. Either we have hope within us or we don’t; it’s a dimension of the soul; it’s not essentially dependent on some particular observation of the world or estimate of the situation. Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced, and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously headed for early success, but, rather, an ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed.’

There is nothing for me to add to this statement: it is simple and profound in equal measure. To live this, however imperfectly, is a worthy aim for the year ahead.

We might start with One day we finally know what we have to do, and that day, on the cusp of a new year, is now.

Wishing you a hopeful, peaceful, and meaningful 2026,

Scott