Snyder defines hope as the “sum of the mental willpower and waypower that you have for your goals”. This definition has three elements: goal setting, agency and choices. Let’s have a look at each of these in turn.
First, a goal. For hope to be useful, it needs to be anchored to a concrete goal. Hope is best supported when the goal important to us, and we clearly understand and can represent it in our minds.
Secondly, hope requires as sense of agency (Snyder calls this willpower). This involves a sense of being able to influence our own future and work towards our goal. It involves motivation, determination and commitment.
The third element is identifying choices and pathways, (what Snyder calls waypower). This involves the capacity for pathways thinking. This is the ability to come up with mental plans or roadmaps that guide helpful thought and action towards our goal. It includes the ability to anticipate roadblocks and come up with flexible strategies to continue to work towards a goal in the face of obstacles (or to come up with a variation of our goal if necessary).