#95 - Kathryn Goetzke, Hopelessness is the Single Most Powerful Predictor of Violence

Scarlett Lewis’ guest is Kathryn Goetzke, founder of the Shine Hope Company. They discuss why hope is foundational for all of us. Kathryn has dedicated her life to growing hope within individuals by letting everyone know that we all experience hopelessness and how to find our way back to hope. Hopelessness is the single most powerful predictor of violence as well as suicide. Kathryn shares her personal story of losing her father to suicide that put her on a mission to teach everyone around the world the 'how' to hope, based on research that hope is a teachable skill. Hope is predictive of retention, performance, productivity, and engagement, and is a protective factor against anxiety and depression. The first step is to take our power back by pausing and thoughtfully responding with love instead of reacting. We need to learn to control the 90 seconds between stimulus and response. The second step is to cultivate healthy habits including diet and exercise to help us during stressful events. The third step is action and goal setting. You are more likely to achieve something if you write it down and check in with someone on how you are achieving these goals. Additionally, hope is a precursor to happiness and resilience, meaning we need to activate hope to feel happy and have resilience. Hopelessness is learned through adversity and is often a consequence of oppression and discrimination; hope is also learnable, but only if we teach it. Listen to this podcast to find out how to activate hope within yourself, your school and community!  www.theshinehopecompany.com