Finding Peace in Uncertainty
If I could give you a magic coin that would allow you to see how your future unfolded, would you take it?
I’ll give you a few moments to ponder on this…
I asked my boyfriend this the other day and without a moments hesitation he replied, “no way”. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve asked the same question to friends, colleagues and clients and their answers weren’t quite so resounding or certain.
Many people made the decision to take the coin, which, given the uncertainty of the past two years, isn’t that crazy.
Uncertainty isn’t something that we, as humans, cope well with because we have forward thinking brains. We like to think that we can see into the future. But when the future we see is uncertain or hazy it triggers the amygdala in the brain which is responsible for producing emotions such as fear and anxiety.
According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, feeling safe and secure is the most essential of human needs after physiological needs such as food, water and homeostasis are met. If we don’t feel certain in what our future looks like then we are left with the question “Am I safe? Is there safety in the future?”. In short, the brain perceives uncertainty as a threat for our basic needs and survival.
It’s interesting to reflect back on my younger self who was so confident in how life would unfold and to compare that to where I sit today. I have dreams, goals, ambitions like everyone else, but also a realisation that I simply can’t know what life might look like 10 years from now. I mean, I bet no-ones ten year plan included a global pandemic right? Mine certainly didn’t.
The connection between uncertainty and happiness has come to the forefront of research the last couple of months. And I know from my own experience and also through working with many clients, that there’s an atmosphere of fear for the future. No-one knows what the future of work is going to look like. Nor travel. Or the long term impact on the financial market. There’s eco-anxiety for our planet. There’s plenty of uncertainty for the brain to navigate, so it’s no wonder that so many people are feeling anxious, afraid, overwhelmed, stuck.
So what can we do?
There is a beautifully simple answer here and a practice that really has grounded me during some pretty challenging and uncertain times.
Step 1
Write everything that is going on in your mind onto a piece of paper or journal. Sounds a little too basic right? But our thoughts are like a swirling tornado in our mind, abstract and hard to pinpoint. A bit like dreams, our thoughts go from one place to another or morph from one idea into another. It can be really hard to know what exactly you’re thinking. Writing your thoughts down helps to make them concrete so that you can start to see them for what they really are. Imagine if I asked you to multiply 462 by 271 without writing it down… not many people could do that. Well that’s like trying to figure out our thoughts without writing them down. So write everything down, your to-do lists, your worries, your anxieties, your fears, your dinner plans etc
Step 2
Refocus on the present moment and ask yourself:
Is it really as bad as I think it is? Is it really that bad?
We tend to jump straight into the worst case scenario, but is it really going to be that bad?
Right now, am I okay?
It’s easy to look into the future and create these terrifying scenarios, but in this very moment, this exact second, am I okay? This encourages you to wake up and step outside of worrying about what could go wrong and instead be in this present moment.
Right now, is anything wrong?
Look around and see if you’re making it out to be worse than it really is. Like the previous question, this helps you to refocus on right now rather than possibilities.
Right now, is there a threat?
We know the brain is there to keep us safe and is always on the look out for potential threats but come back to this moment, are you safe?
What is beautiful in this moment?
I’m always talking about our human negativity bias, and our tendency to focus on the negative rather than the positive and this taps into that same idea. Instead of spiralling into a cycle of negativity make the brain find everything that is beautiful in this moment, that you can enjoy right now.
"My life has been filled with terrible misfortune; most of which never happened.”
Michel de Montaigne
I’m going to leave you with a piece of research to ponder:
85 percent of what subjects worry about never actually happens. Of the 15 percent that does happen, 79 percent of subjects discovered either they could handle the difficulty better than expected, or the difficulty taught them a lesson worth learning. This means that 97 percent of what you worry over is not much more than a fearful mind punishing you with exaggerations and misperceptions.
Don’t let a fear of the unknown stop you from enjoying the life you’re living right now.
Until next time,
Alexandra
