Sale!

17 Cultivating Hope Exercises

Tools
(6 customer reviews)

Hope is often misunderstood as wishful thinking. In fact, research shows it’s a measurable cognitive process involving goals, agency, and pathways thinking. Moreover, it’s a key predictor of resilience, engagement, and recovery from adversity.

These 17 exercises translate the science of hope into practical, structured strategies. Grounded in Snyder’s Hope Theory and supported by psychological and neuroscientific research, this tool pack helps clients clarify what matters, access their inner resources, and take purposeful steps forward.

Each tool is designed to create a measurable impact in coaching sessions, therapy work, workshops, and group interventions.

Original price was: $ 47.Current price is: $ 33.

You will be equipped with the following tools:

  • Awe Walking to Cultivate Hope

    Help clients cultivate a sense of wonder, shift their perspective, and expand their sense of possibility by savouring the awe-inspiring aspects of the world around them.

  • Be The Exception Mindset

    Help clients identify and challenge hope-removing thoughts by recognizing exceptions to negativity bias, broadening perspective, and taking small, meaningful actions.

  • Cultivating Hope Through Reciprocity

    Help clients build a reciprocity mindset by recognizing and practicing giving and receiving as natural, abundant, and trust-building in both personal and professional life.

  • Design Your Media Environment

    Encourage clients to reduce stress-inducing media and design a supportive media environment by tracking its impact and choosing content that uplifts, informs, and aligns with their values.

  • Finding Glimmers

    Encourage clients to notice and reflect on brief positive “glimmers” to build habits that boost hope, connection, and overall wellbeing.

  • From Eco-Anxiety to Eco-Hope

    Support clients in transforming eco-anxiety into eco-hope by validating their emotions, clarifying values, and identifying empowering, value-based actions.

  • Holding Space for Hopelessness

    This tool aims to guide practitioners in holding space for clients experiencing hopelessness by prioritizing validation and compassionate presence.

  • Hope Circle

    Help clients create a Hope Circle to foster resilience, strengthen relationships, and build optimism by holding consistent space for hope and possibility.

  • Hope in Motion

    Help clients shift from feeling powerless to taking intentional action by identifying one micro-action they can take toward a personal or societal challenge.

  • Hope Resume

    Help clients identify past successes and strengths to boost belief in their resilience and foster hope for navigating current and future challenges.

  • Hopeful Adaptation

    Help clients strengthen pathways thinking by identifying alternative routes, adapting goals, and viewing setbacks as opportunities for growth.

  • Hopeful Conversations

    Help clients engage in constructive conversations by cultivating hope, empathy, and mutual understanding, especially when navigating disagreement.

  • Seeing Through Their Eyes

    Guide clients to reduce “us vs. them” thinking through perspective-taking that fosters empathy, compassion, and a more hopeful view of others.

  • Strengths Journaling for Hope

    Support clients in building a hopeful mindset by focusing on strengths and past successes through journaling, reinforcing their confidence to face challenges and create a positive future.

  • The Trust Experiment

    Help clients cultivate hope through small acts of trust that challenge fear, foster connection, and reinforce optimism about relationships and the future.

  • The “What Else?” Game

    Help clients improve cognitive flexibility by rapidly generating alternative solutions, fostering creative, adaptive, and more hopeful thinking in pursuit of their goals.

  • Transforming Cynicism

    Help clients reframe cynicism as healthy skepticism open to possibility, using reality-testing to challenge negative assumptions and build evidence-based optimism.

This pack includes 17 evidence-based exercises for use in therapy, coaching, and group settings. Each tool is designed to help clients strengthen agency, emotional resilience, and a future-focused mindset — especially during times of uncertainty, stagnation, or recovery from adversity.

Grounded in Snyder’s Hope Theory and related psychological research, the exercises offer structured guidance, clear instructions, and clinical relevance. Whether supporting goal-setting, navigating setbacks, or rebuilding motivation, these tools provide a flexible framework for meaningful change.

Download the pack to support your clients in building hope and taking purposeful steps forward.

The following experts create our tools and resources:

  • Hugo Alberts

    Ph.D.

  • Julia Poernbacher

    M.Sc.

  • Lucinda Poole

    Psy.D.

  • Jo Nash

    Ph.D.

  • Lorena Berber

    M.Sc.

  • Emma Mudge

    BSc (Hons), PGCert, PGDip

This resource is designed for practitioners, therapists, and mental health professionals dedicated to supporting positive aging. It is ideal for those looking to help individuals maintain a sense of purpose, adaptability, and well-being while fostering resilience and meaningful connections in later life.

Each tool in this pack is rooted in evidence-based principles and has been developed with input from experts in psychology and behavioral health. Research shows that hope plays a crucial role in building resilience, maintaining motivation, and fostering emotional well-being. Far from being a passive feeling, hope involves a dynamic process of setting goals, identifying pathways, and sustaining the drive to move forward. This collection offers practical, evidence-informed strategies to help individuals cultivate hope in meaningful and sustainable ways. Practitioners can use these tools to support clients in strengthening their sense of purpose, agency, and direction, particularly during periods of change or challenge.

These tools are intended for adult clients and can be applied across a wide range of life contexts. They are designed to support individuals navigating personal or professional transitions, periods of uncertainty, or recovery from setbacks. Flexible and adaptable, the tools help clients build psychological resilience, reconnect with core values, and sustain a hopeful outlook as they move forward with clarity and purpose.

These tools are designed to be flexible and straightforward to implement. Each exercise is a ready-to-use resource with clear instructions, practical tips, and detailed guidance to support you through the process. They can be used individually or incorporated into your existing therapeutic approach, allowing you to adapt them to your specific client needs and professional environment.

Yes, each tool includes clear, step-by-step instructions, practical guidance, and thorough descriptions, making them simple to integrate into your current therapeutic or coaching approach. They are designed to be flexible and adaptable, allowing you to seamlessly incorporate them into your sessions with clients.

Upon purchase, you will receive access to a .zip file containing all the tools as PDFs. If you have any difficulty accessing the tools, please contact us at [email protected].

Absolutely! These tools are versatile and can be used by anyone interested in enhancing their personal well-being and growth. Designed to build resilience, support cognitive and emotional vitality, and nurture a hopeful mindset, they are valuable for both personal use and professional applications across a range of life stages and challenges.

Yes, these tools are adaptable for individual clients, groups, teams, and diverse client populations. You are encouraged to use your professional experience and expertise to tailor the tools to meet the unique needs of each client and scenario.

Yes, but in order to promote good practice, please note that you are advised to use the tools within the boundaries of your professional expertise. For instance, if you are a certified clinician, you are advised to use the training within clinical psychology.

Yes, each tool is grounded in extensive research from the fields of psychology and behavioral science. This toolkit bridges scientific insight and practical application, providing practitioners with evidence-based strategies to support individuals in strengthening hope, enhancing emotional and cognitive wellbeing, and maintaining a sense of direction and purpose.

You’re free to download these tools in PDF format and print them for your personal or professional use, such as in a coaching or therapy setting. You’re not allowed to publish these tools publicly.

Within seven days of your purchase, if you decide that the tools aren’t for you, we’ll be happy to offer a refund.

Absolutely! Send us an email at [email protected] and we will gladly help you.

Description

  1. Vince Hooker

    The 17 Cultivating Hope Exercises is an excellent resource for psychologists and coaches to help their clients become hopeful about their future. Like the other tools PositivePsychology.com provides, these exercises follow an excellent structure that makes them easy to understand and implement. The tools help me reflect more closely on concepts such as hope, awe, and compassion with my clients!

    Vince Hooker Principal Project Officer

  2. Ghida Hage Eid

    I found the Cultivating Hope Tools incredibly powerful and refreshingly unique. Throughout my coaching practice, I’ve drawn from multiple modalities to help clients overcome challenges and achieve meaningful outcomes, but I realised that hope was never an intentional part of my strategy. This resource shifted my perspective. It’s given me a new framework to work with! On a personal level, I’ve tried some of the exercises myself and noticed a real difference—I feel lighter, more optimistic, and genuinely hopeful about life again. This toolpack has added depth not only to my coaching but to my own mindset as well.

    Ghida Hage Eid Life and Executive Coach

  3. Kevin Gallagher MSc

    This is an impressive collection of tools which practitioners can add to their toolset and use as needed. Some tools are a reworking of standard therapeutic approaches (empathy, staying with discomfort, challenging negative thinking) while others are creatively new ideas and techniques such as the Hope Resumé and the What Else Game. I was most impressed by the initial explanation of the rationale for hope and the benefits of opening to this idea in a therapeutic practice in the first place. Overall, a very useful collection!

    Kevin Gallagher MSc EAP Counsellor Therapist

  4. Esen Kılıç

    These tools not only strengthened my sense of hope but also deepened my mental resilience, inner clarity, and connection with others. One practice that particularly moved me was “Holding Space for Hopelessness.” It reminded me that the first step to cultivating hope is allowing space for hopelessness without judgment. The set is incredibly versatile—suitable for both personal use and group facilitation. Each exercise is grounded in science, yet offered through creative, emotionally resonant pathways. I highly recommend this toolkit for coaches, therapists, educators, and anyone working in the well-being space.

    Esen Kılıç Consultant

  5. Kristin Sellke, LPC, NBC-HWC

    This is a great bundle! I love these activities, and I can easily do them with clients during sessions. These activities were tangible for the clients and helped them connect the concepts. The bonus pack of visuals is awesome! Again, it helps the clients retain concepts with more than auditory processing, adding visual processing, too.

    Kristin Sellke, LPC, NBC-HWC Therapist, Coach

  6. Jessica Willis, M.Ed., LPC-S, TM-MS, TLHT-FL

    These tools exceeded my expectations! It’s packed with practical, insightful information that’s not only useful but also easy to apply. Absolutely worth every penny – highly recommend!

    Jessica Willis, M.Ed., LPC-S, TM-MS, TLHT-FL Licensed therapist

Add a review

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

[]