‘Holding onto Hope — When all the roads are closed; can we find a psychologically informed route through?

14.10.2022: As I write this week’s PIE blog, as the lead for Psychologically Informed Environments (PIE), at the national youth homeless charity; Centrepoint, I am once again on a very early train to Manchester to deliver reflective practice and staff support sessions to our amazing frontline teams there. I do not mind admitting I am tired but not just from the very early 5am start. I am tired because as a parent of children in the current generation, I am struggling to hold onto ‘hope’ for their future. I feel anxious about what opportunities they will have. Will they be able to afford their own house with rising interest rates, energy and food prices and the cost of living crises? How will they/we afford for them to attend further education if they wish to do so? What does their future look like with the current geopolitical situation in the east of Europe? What will their wider environment be like after the effects of climate change? However, my children come from a place of relative privilege compared to many of the homeless young people that Centrepoint supports. They have a supportive family network and a safe roof over their head with access to ‘enough’ of what they need for now. For a homeless young person aged 16–25 years old right now, the struggle is even greater. How do they keep ‘hope’ when their future is beset with so many challenges?

This week has been marked by ‘World Mental Health Day’ (c.f. https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/our-work/public-engagement/world-mental-health-day) and ‘World Homelessness Day’ (http://www.worldhomelessday.org/), events designed to shine a spotlight on these two issues, which are often not mutually exclusive. I have reflected on this previously (see PIE blog here: https://drhelenmiles.medium.com/mental-health-homelessness-time-for-a-change-to-break-the-link-8621f6513e7), as both are issues that often face the young people that we support in Centrepoint. However, in this blog I want to reflect further on a concept that perhaps underlies both, and can particularly effect our psychological well-being and impact on our resilience to meet the challenges that being homeless and/or having mental health difficulties can present. That is ‘hope’. How do we face each day when we may be struggling with our mental health or not have a safe and secure place to call ‘home’? How do we keep our ‘hope’ alive, when things feel particularly difficult and perhaps even hold that ‘hope’ for the young people we support when things can feel quite ‘hopeless’ right now?

‘Hope’ is defined as ‘a feeling of expectation and desire for a particular thing to happen’ and ‘grounds for believing that something good may happen’ (Oxford English Dictionary, 2022). It has also been defined as ‘the belief that your future will be better than the present and that you have the ability to make it happen’ (Snyder, 2003). Essentially hope is related to optimism, and is an attitude or outlook that good things will happen and our wishes or aims will ultimately be fulfilled. Having hope is a powerful motivator that drives a ‘can do’ attitude and helps us stay focused on future goals, adapt to change and increase our ability to manage when faced with adverse circumstances. However, ‘hope’ is somewhat of a vague concept and psychologists have found it difficult to measure, and highly variable between individuals (Preston, 2021). Nevertheless, it is very much linked to our psychological well-being, as it serves as a ‘buffer’ against negative and/or stressful life events and those with higher levels of hope have better outcomes across a variety of life domains; academic, occupational or physical / psychological health (Hart et al, 2008; Luthans, 2010; Flett et al, 2011; Long et al, 2020). Therefore, many psychologists (e.g. Snyder, 2003) have focused on the concept of ‘hope’ and how we might go about increasing it in ourselves and others as part of a ‘positive psychology approach’ that emphases the importance of developing strengths and positive traits, rather than just addressing deficits or needs.

Specifically, ‘hope theory’ (yes there is such a thing!) argues that hope has three distinct parts. The first is goals — this is the cornerstone of hope and they may be big (e.g. I will achieve this qualification) or small (e.g. I will complete this task at work today). The second is agency — the ability to stay motivated to meet your goals and believing that good things will come from our actions if we do achieve them. Finally, pathways — the specific routes we develop to meet our goals and knowing that if one pathway does not work, which may be quite likely, then we can problem solve to find another that does. Hope is therefore not an emotion (although it does involve our emotions), rather it is a way of thinking or state of being and therefore it can be enhanced or cultivated in ourselves or those homeless young people we support.

However, it is difficult to hold onto hope — especially perhaps in the current context. Young people today face bigger challenges than ever; for example with housing. A recent report from Metropolitan Thames Valley Housing: MTVH (https://news.sky.com/story/housing-fears-damaging-young-peoples-mental-health-and-affecting-life-decisions-such-as-whether-to-have-children-research-suggests-12536914) found that around 78% of young people surveyed said uncertainty about their future living situation was preventing them from making other decisions about their future such as applying for certain employment options or starting a family. Moreover, as Geeta Nanda OBE (CEO of MTVH) notes; “the devastating impact the failure to tackle the housing crises is having on young people’s well-being is truly shocking”. The hope of owning their own home for many young people is now a dream not a reality, and shortages of even social housing and high rents mean that even being able to live independently even without a mortgage is becoming more and more difficult for young people.

Specifically, the average house price in the UK hit a record high of £276,759 at the start of 2022. However, the average 18–29 year old only earns £23,250 (Sky News, 2022) and interest rates for mortgages are set to rise further in the coming year according to recent predictions from the UK Bank of England (2022). There is therefore a lack of affordable homes as well as social housing, and this is a problem that is increasing despite promises from the current UK government that this issue is being addressed. Data from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (2020–2021) state that for this period 5,955 social rent houses were built whilst 17,262 were sold off, giving an overall net loss of over 15,000 houses. This is why Centrepoint’s new Independent Living Scheme is so important to develop a model of affordable housing for young people (c.f. https://centrepoint.org.uk/what-we-do/independent-living-programme/).

Maintaining hope if you a homeless young person in Centrepoint cannot just be challenging when you think about your future housing options. Given that many of the young people that the charity supports come from backgrounds beset with trauma and adverse childhood experiences (ACE’s: Anda et al, 2010), it is not surprising that they have future expectations of further negative experiences. If your past relationships with family have been conflictual and/or disrupted, it can be difficult to hold onto the hope that future relationships with professionals may be positive and supportive. If your previous experience of education has been characterised by failure and exclusion, why would you be hopeful that you could attend college or a work place and succeed in the future? If you are struggling to survive on a basic Universal Credit income (https://twitter.com/centrepointuk/status/1575495879238119426), how can you have hope that your finances will improve in the future? When childhood social care system experiences have been rejecting, distressing or traumatic, why should you now engage with current statutory services or even Centrepoint staff even if they are saying that they will support and help you.

The challenge is therefore to keep ‘hope’ alive and cultivate it in ourselves as well as others. From a psychologically informed perspective, this is important, because research indicates that in young people aged 11–18 years, hope predicted future well-being particularly in the transition years of adolescence, and supported young peoples’ development into adulthood (Ciarrochi et al, 2015). Keeping our hope even when it can be difficult or we feel too ‘tired’ keeps us future focused, keeps us setting and actively pursuing our goals and helps us adapt to different challenges that we may face thereby building our ‘resilience’. However, it can be particularly difficult when we are trying to keep the hope alive for others — perhaps the homeless young people we support in Centrepoint when they are facing significant challenges. Nevertheless, all the psychological evidence suggests that it is important we keep trying.

So how can we do this? How do we cultivate a hopeful attitude or mind-set in ourselves and others? Psychologists (e.g. Synder, 2003) suggest that it is important that we keep ‘goal orientated’ but setting ourselves (and those we support) clear goals. Of course, these must manage the fine line between what is aspirational and what is achievable. It is great to believe that I might one day manage a whole yoga class without collapsing but right now just 20 minutes each day is far more achievable, and still beneficial for my mental and physical well-being. Therefore, it is helpful to break down our challenges into smaller actionable steps that are within our control, and reward each step once achieved to motivate us to keep going on to the next one. In other words, ‘one step at a time’ or ‘one day at a time’, each goal achieved increasing our hope we can reach the next. It can also be useful to reframe our goals as exciting challenges rather than feared challenges. Perhaps we can take a moment to imagine what it might feel like to reach a goal — who would we tell? How would we celebrate? How might it make us feel?

As per an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) approach developed by the psychologist Steven Hayes in the 1980s, aligning our goals with our values (or interests) is also useful. It is much easier to keep our motivation and hope alive if we are focused on something that is important or relevant to our values in life. It is also key to keep our perspective — so rather than just focusing on what we have not achieved we should try to also focus on what we have. I reflected in last week’s PIE blog (see here: https://drhelenmiles.medium.com/seeing-the-bigger-picture-a-psychologically-informed-discussion-of-how-we-perceive-the-world-d57f42f5c01a) about the importance of ensuring we see the ‘bigger picture’ for our psychological well-being, and this is particularly key when we are thinking about keeping our hope alive. Perhaps X has worked out, but maybe Y or Z has? Can we focus on what we have done well rather than what we have not to keep our hope alive for the future? Many of our homeless young people in Centrepoint have ‘survived’ significant adversity, and reminding them of just what they have achieved in spite of the challenges they have faced to date can keep their hope alive for future positive outcomes in the future. This of course, does not dismiss their experiences to date, but enables them to see their strengths despite adversity, that they can utilise and build upon for the future.

Keeping hope alive requires effort. We have to keep going. If one approach does not work, we need to try another. Modelling this in our own lives as well as with our colleagues and the homeless young people we support is critical. If plan A fails, do we have a Plan B or C? Life is challenging, whoever we are and wherever we are working. We should expect ‘roadblocks’, perhaps the road is temporarily closed; just like in the picture for this blog I took in a local street to me. Does this mean we just stop and wait for the road to reopen or do we try to find an alternative route? Perhaps it does mean it might take slightly longer, but we will still reach our destination eventually (and who knows what we might see on our detoured journey on the way!)

Finally, keeping our sense of humour has been found to be critical in maintaining our hope for the future (Vilaythong et al, 2003). What can we still laugh about to feel better even if sometimes we feel all hope is lost? Moreover, we draw strength from our relationships with others, so who can we talk to when we are feeling ‘hopeless’? Who can support us if we start to lose ‘hope’? It is important to remember we are not alone, and to reach out to others if we are struggling to maintain our hope (or hold the hope for the homeless young people we support). The road ahead, especially for young people, may feel difficult right now but we can keep hopeful if we apply a psychologically informed perspective to the challenges ahead…