Clark, truth is perceptual, it extends no further than an individuals perception, so I`m lost when you refer to "the truth" What is darkness and despair for one may be reason for inspiration and hope for another..One may also evolve into that other. There is nothing substantive to be discovered here. You discuss simply state of mind, and states of mind are in constant flux.

Society paints us with a broad brush, and for that matter I`d even question whether social workers should have got anywhere near the subject of sociology.

I also agree with this sentiment, and "what is" knows not the difference between the published gods and you your good self. This is highly significant and mighty powerful, indeed, one is only a small step away from a whole new theory of ageing (of partial ageing) with this. Our life blood is in youth, surely, for the opposing direction only leads us to decrepitation, decay and death itself.. We however tend to being socially programmed, wittingly or not, to discriminate by generation, certainly by wide disparity of generation. We are obliged to focus on a dictate of unquestioned advantages to being older/old, and to actually think that being older/ageing is better.

How many sixteen year olds have you seen hanging out with seventy somethings this week, beyond family you`ll likely never come across it once in a lifetime, and even should you, to slow ageing one would have to be accepted into the flock of young people without prejudice, so as just another young person. We are programmed with all kinds of fantastical reasons as to why it is that we`d have nothing in common, and that it would even be wrong. We are easily programmed, we just accept them, and once accepted it forms a part of personal reality. Secretly though, for we are induced to fear the conversation, for some perhaps even subliminally, we want our youth back, we want to be let back in. Because this never actually happens we never avoid ageing.

The brain controls the endocrine system, the immune system, we are hard wired, so what do you suppose happens when we are made to feel different, older, than those we would most wish to identify ourselves with? We age, or at least we very likely age significantly faster than we otherwise might. I`m acquiring physical world records through my mid sixties, but I know that i`m nineteen years old. Perhaps it is possible to side track the social prejudice.

Hope is the watered down form of expectation. Whilst we may be joyous in our hope, it is also true to say that more than a comparatively little of it is in fact expectation - as convenient as it might be for us to still refer to it as hope.

There is a second nature of hope which immediately springs to mind: that hope - and it can be just as much - can never be fulfilled. I am not of the opinion that hope is our life blood: it is the balance of hope to contentment. The better the balance, the more stable the mind. Too much hope can be toxic, and may turn to depression.

Likewise with regards to contentment. More than enough contentment tends to lead to complacency; complacency to apathy; and apathy to depression. More than a healthy amount of hope is the cause of being catastrophically let down.