“Letting there be room for not knowing is the most important thing of all.” – Pema Chodron, Buddhist Monk, teacher, author

Isn’t our day made up of mostly not knowing, the kind of ongoing “not knowing” like if our appointments will be on time, or not knowing if we used enough deodorant? Certainly the not knowing Pema Chodron refers to is of the deeper and inner personal variety, but not knowing is part of being human and living this life. We, westerners seem to want certainty and security in our lives, in our jobs, families, leaders and in our day-to-day.

Insurance was created to offer security and guarantees for people. Be it life, home or medical; insurance exists to ideally offer a safety net against bad things happening, the unknown. It is a growth industry that we pay regularly almost as a gamble should we have a mishap and need resources to get us through. Insurance is like hedging our bets. We want to know there is a limit to our risk. Yet times are changing and even the insurers aren’t comfortable with the risk and “not knowing” anymore.

Many of us may want to control or mitigate that feeling of not knowing. Maybe we are facing something about ourselves, like not knowing how we come across to others versus how we imagine we come across ? Or do we do things that may distract us from what we don’t know and can’t control? Not knowing is uncomfortable but what if we embraced not knowing? Or at the very least accepted and expected it, allowing for there to be room for the not knowing in our lives? Can we leave room for not knowing and in that space also hold onto a sense of calm, and maybe even feel some quiet joy, in the face of not knowing what is next?

If we’d grown up understanding “not knowing “as a healthy and inevitable part of being alive, we might reframe the fear that the feeling of not knowing can invoke, and treat it as “mystery”. Mystery is more about curiosity and wonder, and that energy might better serve us when we allow room for not knowing.

As Seneca, a Stoic philosopher wrote, “The whole future lives in uncertainty: live immediately.”