Aegroto dum anima est, spes esse dicitur.
(M. Tullius Cicero, Ad Atticum 9.10.3)

pron = ai-GROH-toh doom AH-nee-mah ehst spays EHS-say DIK-ih-toor

It is said that for a sick person, while there is breath, there is hope.

Comment: On December 7 43 BC, Marcus Tullius Cicero was murdered.
His head and hands were severed from his body and stuck on poles in the public square for all to see what happens to those who oppose change. The politics that brought Cicero to his violent death are too complex to discuss here. It is interesting to note, though, on this anniversary of is death, Cicero's own notion, written to his friend Atticus, of the hope for change in a human life.

While there is breath, there is hope. While there is breath, there is possibility. While there is breath, this breath, this breath I am taking in and letting go of right now, there is all of the power of this present moment. And I can choose to be in this moment, or to squander it on worry or guilt, the future or the past. There may be many things about which I have little or no choice, but I can choose to be in this breath. I can choose to be here, now.

So, if I can be here, now, in this breath, I really don't need to hope. I am. Hope is future talk. Regret is past talk. Being, here, now. That's the power of this breath that I am breathing.

What am I doing with today, while I have breath?