This week my husband flew to Sydney to conduct the funeral of yet another one of his childhood friends.

She was the third to take her own life.

As he talked to the others at the wake, he made the observation that she had money, life experiences and adventure, friends, family, but those who knew her best said she had no "hope".

Like most of his friends from his younger days, she was heavily into hard drugs, but the other friends he talked to said the drugs were the remedy for the hopelessness.

I feel it's a tragedy that someone feels the solution to life is premature death. It got me thinking about hope.

I believe we're all born with "hope"... it's something we as humans have in our makeup. Life experiences can either help nurture or crush that hope. As we grow, we make choices that encourage or discourage the presence of hope in our lives.

So... I know we all need hope to really LIVE, but do we need hope to stay alive?