Anchored Hope: The One Thing Authoritarians Fear Most
What it is, how you build it, and why it makes resistance last.
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Dear friends
I hope you’ll forgive me for sending this post again. When I woke this morning, I realised the title and image hadn’t done it justice. They gave off a feeling of doom, when this is really a message of hope. I’ve changed them to better reflect the heart of the piece — and I’m sending it again for the 80% of readers who didn’t open it the first time.
There are times when what we need most is not comfort, but clarity. When the terrain shifts so quickly, so relentlessly, that we begin to question what’s real, what’s right, and whether anything we do still matters. In moments like these, it’s easy to feel disoriented. Isolated. Bone-weary.
That’s not happening by accident — it's by design.
Authoritarianism seeks to extinguish the belief that what is right and human and just still matters — and can still shape what comes next. It tells us the future is closed, that power cannot be moved, and that those who resist will suffer alone.
It does this not only through force, but through repetition. Over time, the same message appears in different forms: in public speeches and rewritten laws, in silenced dissent and redefined norms, in the slow grinding down of our moral outrage, until all that remains in its place is grief and fatigue.
The goal of authoritarianism is not merely to control our actions, but to reshape our inner landscapes of what feels possible. Ultimately, authoritarianism wants to make us forget that there were ever other ways to live:
That truth carries weight. That when someone speaks it plainly, it can expose injustice, halt wrongdoing, or compel those in power to respond. That facts aren’t just weapons in a battle of opinions, but anchors — shared reference points that help people find their footing.
That solidarity is strength. That people stand together not because it's safe, but because it's the right thing to do. That neighbours share food when shelves are bare. That strangers form human chains to protect the vulnerable. That across borders, across languages, across histories, people find ways to lift each other up — not as a gesture, but as a strategy for survival.
That we can experience joy, even in the midst of struggle. That people can still laugh together, even after hard news. That music can still be made, even when spirits are low. That a shared meal, a kind word, or a quiet moment of connection could remind us we haven’t lost ourselves, that we are still human — still capable of beauty, tenderness, even celebration. Authoritarianism fears that kind of joy because it proves the spirit is not yet broken. It reveals that even under pressure, something free and ungoverned still lives.
Authoritarianism tries to erase our memories of these things on purpose. Because when we remember what we are capable of together, we become much harder to divide, isolate, or control. And so, by dulling our memory of those things — and our belief that we might return to them — authoritarianism closes the future into a single, suffocating shape, where power is fixed, outcomes are predetermined, and obedience is the only rational response.
But that story is false. And it is only the survival of hope — stubborn, anchored hope — that will allow us not just to keep remembering these things, but to build from them.
This is not a fleeting or fragile kind of hope. Untethered hope — hope that depends on outcomes, headlines, or the permission of those in power — is easily shaken. It rises — but then falls with each new wave of repression. It becomes fragile, volatile, reactive. And in the face of a system designed to disorient and exhaust, untethered hope will not hold.
Hope needs to be rooted in something deeper. In values that are not up for negotiation — values that hold even when laws change or institutions fall silent. But deeper still, hope must be anchored — moored to something solid.
It must be anchored in a vision of human dignity that no regime can erase. Not a vague ideal, but a lived truth: that every human being has inherent worth, that each voice matters, that even under surveillance, suppression, or exile, the core of who we are remains intact. That cruelty is never justified by order. That justice, even when buried, is not lost.
That dignity is not granted by governments — it cannot be revoked.
Anchored hope is not about believing that everything will turn out fine. It’s not wishful thinking, and it’s not blind faith. It draws strength from history, from community, from your own lived experience of getting through things you thought you couldn’t. It’s a steady, deliberate decision to keep believing in the possibility of something better, even if the odds feel stacked against us, the path is long, and the outcome uncertain.
It doesn’t rely on external reassurance, nor does it collapse when things get worse. Instead, it adapts. It regroups. It holds fast.
Why Anchored Hope Is the Foundation of Sustained Resistance
Anchored hope keeps three essential parts of us alive: our sense of right and wrong, our ability to act, and our belief that something better is still possible. Authoritarian systems don’t just rely on force. They work slowly and deliberately to wear down those three critical things — until we lose sight of what we stand for, forget what we’re capable of, and stop imagining that things could ever change. Without these three things, resistance fractures, loses coherence, and eventually gives way to despair.
Anchored hope keeps our moral compass intact.
Authoritarianism does not simply impose control through violence or surveillance; it reshapes the moral landscape. Under authoritarian rule, cruelty is often disguised as order, dissent is redefined as treason, and laws are rewritten to make compassion seem criminal. Over time, the constant pressure to survive in such a climate, makes us begin to question our instincts. We stop trusting what we once knew clearly — because right and wrong blur into legal and illegal, safe and unsafe, possible and futile.
Anchored hope cuts through that fog. It reminds us that dignity, justice, and truth still matter — even if saying so comes at a cost. It grounds us in something deeper than the regime’s shifting justifications. That clarity isn’t just personal — it helps others remember too.
Anchored hope protects our sense of agency.
One of the most effective tools of authoritarianism is not fear, but despair. When we stop believing our actions can make a difference, we stop resisting. We fall silent. This is not just psychological; it’s strategic. Demoralisation reduces resistance far more effectively than force alone can.
Anchored hope counteracts that strategy. It understands that there are no guaranteed outcomes, but it enables us to act because we must, not because we are certain of success. This kind of hope is disciplined and steady. It makes room for grief, anger, even doubt — but it doesn’t let those feelings freeze us. It keeps us moving, step by step, through uncertainty.
Anchored hope keeps the door open to a brighter future.
A future where freedom, dignity, and shared responsibility aren't just possible, but foundational.
Authoritarian regimes depend on the illusion that there is no alternative. Once people accept their version of reality as inevitable, resistance fades, and the regime advances unchallenged.
Anchored hope breaks that spell. History is full of moments when people pushed back and changed the course of things. Anchored hope holds onto the memory that other ways of organising society have existed, and can exist again. This is not naïve idealism — it is strategic memory. It reminds us that what seems permanent is often temporary, and that even small acts of defiance — sustained over time — can build something new.
When we remember that freedom is possible — even if distant or hard-won — we are more likely to organise, to preserve knowledge, to form networks, and to prepare for the long arc of resistance. Which is why even in the darkest times, imagining a freer world is itself a form of resistance.
Taken together, these three human capacities — our moral clarity, agency, and ability to imagine a better future — form the core of any sustained resistance, allowing movements to survive when conditions are hostile, fragmented, or violently repressive. Without anchored hope, resistance can become reactive, short-lived, or co-opted. With it, resistance can become durable — even under conditions where outward victory may seem out of reach.
Anchored hope is therefore not an accessory to resilient resistance — it is the inner architecture.
How We Build Anchored Hope
Anchored hope is like a muscle — it grows through use, and through recovery. We don’t need perfect conditions or perfect faith to build it. What we need is practice. Repetition. Care.
So how do we build hope in a world that is designed to erode it?
We start with the smallest act of agency.
Hope strengthens when we do something — however small — that moves us toward what we value. That could be writing a letter, standing up for someone, showing up to a meeting. The act doesn’t even have to succeed — it just has to remind you that you still have a say.
We train it through imagination.
Authoritarianism shrinks the future until only fear remains. So we make space — deliberately — to imagine what else could be true. Not as escapism, but as rehearsal. The mind needs to see something before the heart can believe it’s possible.
We feed it with connection.
Hope weakens in isolation. But when we’re around others who still care, still act, still dream — it rekindles. Even witnessing a stranger’s courage can do it. We remember we’re not alone. And that’s oxygen to a hopeful brain.
We build it by telling the truth.
Pretending everything’s fine doesn’t build hope. Facing what’s hard, together, does. Hope rooted in reality is the kind that lasts. It doesn’t flinch. It says, Yes, this is hard. And yes, I’m still here.
We maintain it with a record.
A hope journal. A victory wall. A story we tell again and again of the time something changed when no one thought it could. That record becomes our evidence. Our library of strength. Our reminder that we’ve come through before — and we can again.
And maybe most of all, we let it rest.
A muscle doesn’t grow while you’re lifting the weight. It grows in the space after. So we pause. We cry. We laugh. We sleep. We let our nervous systems recover from the strain of constant vigilance. Rest is not withdrawal — it’s preparation.
Anchored hope is what carried us through in Zimbabwe under Mugabe’s regime — because hope had to be more than a feeling. It had to be a way of standing firm, holding on, and building something quietly, even when everything visible seemed to be falling apart. It accepts that things may get harder before they get better. It knows that loss and fear and failure are part of the picture. But it also knows that none of those things are the end of the story. Anchored hope makes it possible to grieve what’s broken while still tending to what can be repaired. It keeps us rooted in action — quiet, clear, purposeful — even when there is no guarantee of success.
This is what will enable us to keep going after a crackdown, a betrayal, a setback that would make someone else give up. It’s what will strengthen us to protect our neighbours, maintain records, tell our children the truth, or simply keep showing up, even when the world has gone quiet around us.
Anchored hope is not loud and it’s not performative. But it’s deeply alive. And it's not a feeling — it's a stance. A way of being in the world that says, I will not let go of what matters most — even now, even through this.
And like anything worth holding onto, it needs tending.
With everything unfolding at breakneck speed around us, I’ve been thinking about how we gather ourselves at the start of each week. And I’ve come to realise that we need to begin with hope. Not blind hope. Not shallow optimism. But anchored hope — steady, rooted, and quietly expectant.
I'd like to help you build and sustain that kind of hope by giving you a space to breathe, to remember what holds, and to carry something steady into the week ahead. Next Monday morning, around 10:00 UTC, an uplifting post will be waiting in your mailbox, so you can anchor the week ahead in hope. I aim to keep sending these each Monday until you tell me it’s not for you — or until I run out of things to say.
In solidarity, as ever
— Lori
P.S. These posts will be freely available to all subscribers — hope is something that multiplies when it’s shared.
Thanks chomie you are helping me so.much ,will be looking forward to read your post every Mon