Buffer Against Uncertainty
How’s your relationship with uncertainty these days? For many it feels like uncertainty showed up in March and proceeded to unpack all of her bags and settle in. Not only do you feel like she showed up uninvited and unannounced, you feel powerless against her continued rampage of your life; uncertainty seems to be everywhere now.
Every time you consider the kids going back to school, uncertainty is there. Every time you daydream about travelling, uncertainty pokes up it’s ugly face. Every time you open social media or turn to your news source of choice, uncertainty covers the screen.
Undoubtedly, this new uncertainty that seems to cover everything can have you feeling angry and frustrated that you can’t plan things like you did before. Other times uncertainty brings up a new level of worry about whether things will be OK. Then there are the times that you feel beat down and apathetic toward what’s next. You’re SO tired of not knowing.
What Changed?
What caused your relationship to uncertainty to change? It’s worth noting that uncertainty lived at your address prior to March 2020. You didn’t know with any more certainty what was going to happen in January any more than you do now. So, what actually changed? Probably, your awareness of uncertainty and the role it can play in your life.
Uncertainty was so baked in, so much a part of the fabric of living that you had forgotten and taken it for granted, kinda like the sun rising.
Most of us had counted on things continuing on the way that they had been previously. Our brains take evidence of how things have been and project into the future the same or very similar circumstances. Especially the seemingly immovable concepts our culture has taught us; work, money, health, morality, individualism and community, freedom and justice.
Here is where I have to pause and acknowledge the privilege that I’ve had living in a community and country where, for my lifetime, I’ve been able to count on peace and stability. Crises and emergencies arise of course, I’ve lived in communities that had significant forest fire disasters as well as flooding emergencies. However, I knew not everyone was facing a crisis and emergent and critical needs. I could find some relief by looking out beyond my community and there was support because not everyone was being affected. I recognize that the privilege of living in a stable environment is not the case for so many people around the world, that citizens of so many countries and communities as well as generations before me have faced great fear of the future.
Once you recognize uncertainty is part of our shared human existence, how do you move toward acceptance? When it seems as though everything is unknown, what’s left? When it feels like you can’t count on anything, where do you turn? It’s You!
Trusting Yourself
You focus on trusting yourself. You return back to the only place that you can truly control the trustworthiness – your thoughts, your emotions, your actions. Building self-trust creates an umbrella of certainty that you can count on you that protects you from the deluge of doubt that can be falling all around.
This trust in oneself doesn’t suddenly create certainty in the future or a particular outcome or results. The doubt or worry about the unknown of the future recedes into the background, it no longer occupies a central role because you can lean into the certainty of who you are being right now. You can trust yourself to show up to the process, and you know that you are taking the steps every.damn.day.
Because building trust is an ongoing life-long practice of turning toward oneself. Life is always evolving and trust requires regular attention and nurturing.
What would you do if you were a person who trusted themselves enough? How would your life change if you were someone who believed they would figure it out?
Join me on an exploratory journey toward building a foundation of trust. Become more rooted in yourself, accepting of what arises and know that you have everything you need to handle what’s next. Gather online with an intimate group of smart savvy women to nurture, enrich and deepen your self-trust. These conversations are free and by invitation and will begin in August 2020. You can find more details here.
