"You know, there's no hope for humanity."

"There was hope?"

A conversation I'd had today and heard many times before, with fellow teenagers being the most common. There is no hope left for humanity – nothing we have left for the world. It's a popular opinion, one I have voiced many times. But not long after the above conversation, I realized I was wrong. There is hope left for humanity. Hope for humanity lies in the fingers of my little brother – hands 1,538 months younger than mine. Hope lies in his eyes, which can't see that great yet. Hope lies in the earth he hasn't yet walked. Hope for humanity is not lost – will not be lost.

Hope for humanity is in the youngest of children, and the oldest of humans. It is in the way we curl our fingers around what we love; hope is how we reach for the stars that house our most precious dreams. Hope lives, as though it were a bubble, encompassing what needs to be taken care of – our dreams, our lives, the world we walk in and experience every day.

One does not need to believe in hope for humanity for it to be there. Hope is in every beating heart; in every blade of grass. There are downsides, but you can turn away from the darkness, embrace the light, the hope, for humanity; it's there, and whether or not you realize it, it lives in you.

©The Last Letter