Light Under the Door

I used to think hope was a personality trait.

Like some people were born with it, the way they were born with freckles or long eyelashes. They woke up believing things would work out. They looked toward the future like it was a place that wanted them.

I was not one of those people.

I learned to be careful. To lower expectations before they could hurt me. To keep my joy quiet, like it might jinx itself. I lived by “realistic” the way other people lived by faith.

But then a season came where even realism stopped working. The kind of season where you do all the right things and it still doesn’t get easier. Where your body feels tired in places sleep can’t reach. Where you keep moving because stopping would mean feeling.

One night, I stood in my kitchen and stared at the sink like it had personally offended me. Dishes. Again. Evidence that time was passing and I was still here, still carrying, still doing the bare minimum version of survival.

I remember thinking: If this is life, I don’t want it.

Not in a dramatic way. Not in a dangerous way. Just in a hollow way—like my spirit had gone quiet and I wasn’t sure it would come back.

And then something small happened.

My phone buzzed. A message from someone I hadn’t talked to in a while. Nothing life-changing. Just: “I don’t know why, but you came to mind. How are you… really?”

I stared at it for a long time. I could have ignored it. I had practice at that. But instead, I typed one honest sentence:

“I’m not okay, but I’m still here.”

The reply came quickly: “Thank you for saying that. I’m here. No fixing. Just here.”

I didn’t cry because the problem was solved. I cried because I felt seen without being explained.

That was the first light under the door.

After that, hope didn’t arrive in fireworks. It arrived in tiny things: a morning where my chest felt less tight. A laugh that surprised me. A song that didn’t hurt to hear. A moment at a stoplight where I realized I wasn’t bracing for impact.

I started collecting those moments like drops. Not enough to fill a cup all at once—but enough to prove there was still water somewhere.

Now, when I think about hope, I don’t picture confidence. I picture a door in a dark hallway, and the smallest line of light underneath it.

Hope is not the promise that everything will be okay. Hope is the willingness to believe that you might not always feel like this.

And tonight, that’s enough.