Why being ‘Wonder’ful beats being ‘Hope’ful

There’s no guarantee your job will last the next few months. No guarantee the girl you’re dating will marry you. No guarantee you’ll ever be rich, or even keep a full head of hair a few years down the line (that’s for me, ha!). There’s no guarantee the startup you pour your life savings into won’t collapse in a year. No guarantee your best friend today won’t drift apart tomorrow. Basically, there’s no guarantee of happiness ever!

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Yet, despite this uncertainty, you still hope for it. You still cling to the belief that things will work out, even when you have no evidence they will. You drag yourself through soul-crushing traffic to the office, not because you’re sure it’ll lead to a promotion, but because you hope it might. You pour your energy into making your relationship work, not because you know for sure it’ll lead to marriage, but because you hope it will. You go to the gym, watch what you eat, and take care of your health, not because you’re guaranteed a long, illness-free life, but because you hope to keep your body strong.

Hope drives us, even when there’s no promise of a reward. It’s the force that makes you keep showing up, keep trying, keep believing, despite all the uncertainty life throws your way.

This is why The Shawshank Redemption is rated 9+ on IMDb. It doesn’t just tell a story…it teaches people the value of hope, no matter the odds, no matter the chaos. Andy clings to hope through decades of imprisonment, inspiring audiences to believe in its power.

BUT

It’s not that simple. There’s no book you can read or potion you can drink to magically fill you with hope. You can grind at the gym for two years and get shredded, but you can’t grind through a stack of books and “become hopeful.” It’s not a skill you learn; it’s not a muscle you can build.

So, what now? If hope has no structure, no rules, no guaranteed payoff, should we just fake it? Pretend we have it? Or is it something we’re born with? How come Andy in Shawshank held onto hope for years in prison, but Red couldn’t?

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The only answer I’ve found is this: hope isn’t universal. It’s not something you acquire; it’s a neurological quirk. A brain variation. Neuroscience suggests that hope is tied to the prefrontal cortex…the part of the brain responsible for planning and imagining the future. Some people are wired with more activity in this region, along with a dopamine-driven reward system that keeps them holding on, imagining brighter days ahead, no matter how bleak things seem. Others aren’t as lucky. Their brains don’t fire up the same way, making it harder to cling to hope. That’s why some people are more susceptible for hopelessness, depression-anxiety than others… This isn’t about willpower or effort, it’s biology! And that makes the entire ecosystem of hope feel pointless. If you don’t have the wiring, what’s the point of chasing something you’ll never have?

For me, this realization, that hope isn’t universal, felt both sobering and liberating. Sobering, because it means not everyone has equal access to one of life’s most celebrated motivators. Liberating, because it forced me to ask a different question: if not hope, then what? If we can’t all rely on hope to push us forward, does that mean we’re stranded, incapable of finding meaning or purpose? Does it mean that some of us are just meant to walk through life with no internal compass, nothing to look forward to? Or does it mean we’ve been looking at the wrong thing all along, like a sailor chasing the stars when the ocean was always the real guide? This thought led me to a subtle, powerful shift in perspective: maybe the antidote to hopelessness isn’t more hope. Maybe it’s something else entirely.

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We might not all be wired for hope, but we are wired to wonder. And this is where things start to get interesting. Wonder isn’t some lofty, abstract concept. It’s curiosity at its core…raw, deep, and relentless. It’s the itch you can’t scratch, the question that never lets you rest, the feeling you get when you look at something and just need to understand how it works. Wonder doesn’t need a reason to exist…it’s the engine behind every discovery, every invention, every piece of art. It’s asking, What if? It’s looking at the world and going, But why?

Wonder is different from hope. While hope waits for something to change, wonder doesn’t need an answer to keep going…it thrives in the unknown. It’s the feeling that pushes you to ask why even when there’s no clear answer. It’s the curiosity that drives you to question everything…about yourself, about your work, about people around you. Why do we feel the way we do? Why does a problem at work keep bothering you, and what’s really behind it? Wonder is what keeps you digging, exploring, and learning, no matter how messy things get. It’s the thing that lets you look at a challenge and not see it as an obstacle, but as a puzzle you’re curious enough to solve. Wonder doesn’t wait for life to give you an answer…it makes you part of the answer by asking the right questions and finding meaning in them. It’s the quiet persistence that keeps you moving, not just hoping for something better, but actively searching for ways to make it happen. And this works for both emotions as well your work!

Obviously “wonder” is a core of scientific research. Science doesn’t sit around hoping for answers to appear, it demands them by asking the right questions and testing relentlessly. It thrives in the unknown, digging through chaos to uncover truths. The breakthroughs don’t come from waiting for answers; they come from asking questions and challenging assumptions.

Here’s the twist: CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) works on the same principle, but it’s all about emotions. It doesn’t wait for your life to improve before changing how you feel. Just like science, it digs into your thoughts, making you question where they come from and how they shape your emotional world. It’s curiosity, but focused on understanding your emotions…forcing you to break down patterns and beliefs, just like scientists break down data, to find new meaning and create emotional change.

The irony is, while science uses wonder to uncover facts, CBT uses it to uncover and reshape your emotions.

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This is why I feel wonder is better. Hope can leave you waiting, sometimes endlessly, for something outside of your control to change. Wonder is active… It doesn’t ask you to trust that things will improve on their own…it drives you to explore, to question, to dive into the unknown. Wonder gives you agency. It’s the force behind civilization’s progress, the curiosity that led us to discover galaxies and reshape the world in a few thousand years.

Maybe that’s what Andy was doing all along in Shawshank Redemption. He wasn’t just sitting there hoping for a way out…he was wondering. Wondering if the walls could be broken. Wondering if a tiny hammer could dig through rock. Wondering if the system could be beaten, if the ocean would ever welcome him, if there was life beyond those prison bars. He didn’t just hope for freedom…he was curious enough to figure out how to create it.

Unlike hope, wonder is structured, it’s teachable, it’s deliberate and it’s not limited, it’s infinite! In a way, it’s more powerful.

Because wonder doesn’t hope for happiness. Wonder is happiness!

Thanks for reading! 🙂