The double-edged power of hope
Expectation, illusion and liberation

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Introduction

Hope. A word that sounds so light and yet can weigh so heavily. Hope is what keeps people going in times of war, illness and poverty. Hope is often described as one of humanity’s most beautiful capacities — a source of resilience and a light in the darkness. But in the context of destructive relationships, hope turns out to be an ambiguous phenomenon. There, hope can chain as much as it can liberate.

 

Anyone caught in a relationship where love is intertwined with manipulation, silence or emotional violence soon discovers that hope not only gives strength but also binds. Hope becomes a rope that repeatedly pulls you back into the illusion that tomorrow will be better, that the other will change and that the pain was not in vain. It is the glue that strengthens trauma bonds: returning again and again because hope must not die.

 

In this essay, I explore how hope functions in destructive relationships. I weave together psychological insights with philosophical voices — Camus, who saw hope as an obstacle to true happiness, and Nietzsche, who called hope the “evil of evils” because it prolongs suffering. Their sharp perspectives help me understand why hope is sometimes more a prison than a liberation, and how another form of hope — one connected to truth — can lead to genuine freedom.

 

 

 

The psychological roots of hope

Hope runs deep in human development. As children, we learn hope through dependency: in waiting for a parent’s smile, in longing for warmth and care. When that care becomes irregular or unpredictable, hope settles into the psyche as a survival mechanism.

 

A child confronted with silence, rejection or inconsistent love cannot bear the truth: I am not loved. The psyche chooses hope instead — maybe tomorrow. Maybe if I am kinder. Maybe if I try harder. Hope protects against the unbearable emptiness of acknowledging that the parent falls short.

 

This mechanism repeats itself in adult relationships. In a destructive relationship, hope keeps the system running. Every small sign of affection — a message, a smile, an apology or a promise — feels like proof that the hope was justified. And every moment of rejection or silence can be endured because hope is still alive. Psychologically, this is intermittent reinforcement: irregular rewards hold behavior in place more strongly than constant affirmation ever could.

 

Here, hope functions as a survival instinct. Without it, the emptiness would be unbearable, the pain too sharp and the farewell too final. Hope is the anesthetic that makes it possible to stay.

 

 

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Hope as illusion

But hope in destructive relationships is rarely rooted in reality. It focuses on an image of the other that does not exist — or that appears only in fragments. Hope paints a future picture: when the storm has passed, when therapy works, when this was the last time…

 

It's a mirage. You see an oasis in the distance, but the closer you get, the further it retreats. Yet you keep walking, because standing still feels unbearable. Hope becomes an addiction: chasing the promise again and again — only to be disappointed again and again.

 

Camus wrote in The Myth of Sisyphus that humanity constantly seeks escape routes from the absurdity of existence. Hope, he argued, is one of those escapes: a projection into the future that keeps us from living in the present. In destructive relationships, it works exactly the same way — one does not live in the painful reality of now, but in the illusion of tomorrow. Hope becomes an obstacle to true happiness, because it postpones confrontation with the truth.

 

Nietzsche is even sharper. In Human, All Too Human, he calls hope the “evil of evils” — not because hope is always bad, but because it prolongs suffering. Without hope, the unbearable could not be endured and one might break away from what is toxic more quickly. Hope ensures that people remain, suffer and persevere. It is a poisonous medicine that feeds the illness.

 

 

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Hope as repetition of old wounds

For those who learned in childhood to hold on to hope where love was lacking, hope in adult relationships becomes more than an expectation: it becomes a repetition of old wounds. The hope that mother will speak, that father will smile, that the silence will someday break — that hope continues to live on in the longing that a partner will finally see, acknowledge and change.

 

Thus, hope becomes a sword that reopens old scars. Every moment of silence in the present awakens the silence of the past. Every promise left unfulfilled resonates with the promises that were never kept before. Hope here is not a neutral desire, but an echo of trauma.

 

Psychologically, this is trauma repetition: the unconscious drive to seek out situations where the old story might be rewritten. Philosophically, this connects to Kierkegaard’s idea of repetition: the experience that something presents itself again and again, but never truly finds resolution. Hope is the engine of this repetition — whispering that this time will be different, that the circle will finally be broken. But as long as the other does not truly change, the repetition becomes a prison.

 

 

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Hope as postponement of truth

The most treacherous aspect of hope in destructive relationships is that it postpones the truth. Truth is confronting — this will not change, this is who the other is and this hurts. Hope softens that pain by sketching a future that seems more bearable. But each time you fall back on hope, you push truth further ahead.

 

Here psychology and philosophy meet. Camus urged us to embrace the absurd — not to flee into hope or religion, but to face life as it is. Only by carrying truth can one truly become free. Hope that conceals truth is an obstacle to freedom.

 

Hope in destructive relationships is therefore often a form of self-deception: a lie one tells oneself in order not to feel what is really happening. It is grief postponed, farewell postponed — and with that, freedom postponed.

 

 

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The turning point: hope as liberation

And yet. Hope does not only imprison. There is another kind of hope: a hope not directed at the other, but at yourself. The hope that healing is possible. The hope that your own life can be reshaped. The hope that love can exist without lies, without manipulation and without chains.

 

This hope is not a mirage, but an inner compass. It does not project into an illusory future with the other, but opens space for a new future with yourself. This is the kind of hope Camus might indeed have accepted: not an escape from the present, but a choice to carve out a different path within it.

 

Psychologically, this is the shift from an external to an internal locus of control — the source of change no longer lies with the other, but with you. Philosophically, this touches on Levinas: the responsibility to live in truth, even when the other refuses to. Especially then.

 

 

 

Hope and silence

Hope and silence are closely intertwined. In destructive relationships, silence often forms the breeding ground for hope: every unanswered message can open up a world of expectations: Maybe she is busy, maybe something will come later, maybe silence does not mean it is over.

 

But there is also another kind of silence. Not the silence imposed as punishment, but the silence chosen as response: the silence of no longer reacting. This silence is not a chain but a key. It is the liberating silence in which hope is no longer directed at the other, but at yourself.

 

When, after months of silence, you suddenly receive a flood of messages and choose not to respond, you choose a different hope. Not the hope that the other will change, but the hope that you can be free. This silence breaks the chains — it is filled with strength, with choice, and with truth.

 

 

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Conclusion

Hope is ambiguous. In destructive relationships, it can be a chain that binds, a mirage that draws you further into the no man’s land of illusion. Camus and Nietzsche warn us: hope is often not a light, but an obstacle and a prolongation of suffering. Psychology shows the same: hope fuels trauma bonds and keeps people staying when they should be leaving.

 

And yet another hope is possible. A hope not directed at the other, but at yourself. A hope that is connected to truth and therefore brings not illusion, but liberation.

The key lies in learning to distinguish:

 

• Hope that binds is directed at the other and at change that never comes.

• Hope that liberates is rooted in yourself, in the possibility of healing and in the carrying of truth.

 

Within this lies the paradoxical power of hope. It can be both chain and key, depending on where it is directed. The task of anyone freeing themselves from a destructive relationship is to make that shift: to release false hope and embrace liberating hope.

 

Only then does hope become what it can truly be — not the prolongation of suffering, but the birth of a new beginning.