How long can you “stay with it?” How long can you comfortably stay with uncertainty?
A quick scan of today’s news headlines will reveal the obvious answer. Collectively, we can’t stay with uncertainty for a hot minute. It is so uncomfortable to hang in there and wait for breaking stories to fully develop that we clamor to make sense of the unthinkable. We often begin with blame.
Blame is like instant oats — a quick way to get out of our state of uncertainty. If we can just offload all our internal discomfort by blaming a person, a political party or a group of people, we can rest easy. Blame is the preferred short cut to wiggle and wriggle out of a state of uncertainty.
Yet the reality is that there are no quick fixes that have any staying power for easing the tension of uncertainty. We live in a world where uncertainty is dished out to us by the ladle-full, and we can barely resist it. We lap it up as we scroll through our devices.
Not surprisingly, we have been trained to scoop up uncertainty and then get rid of it as fast as possible. We are in a never ending game of whack-a-mole.
There is another way to face the reality of a world filled with uncertainty. Ironically, the wisdom originates from a young English poet named John Keats in the early 1800’s. John Keats called this rare staying power – Negative Capability.
Brene Brown unpacks this rare, empowering skill in her latest book, Strong Ground:
“Negative Capability is the ability to stay in uncertainty and curiosity without grasping for facts to substantiate your assumptions.”
Let’s sit with this explanation for a few minutes. What John Keats offered to us about 200 years ago is even more critical today. The psychological ability to stay with it without jumping to conclusions, falling for a false narrative, or playing the blame game, is a lost elite skill.
John Keats could have never imagined just how fast and often we would be bombarded with so much uncertainty in today’s modern world. In his time, stories broke at a much slower pace, traveling by handwritten letters, word of mouth and at a snail’s pace in a print shop. Yet even then, the human tendency was to make up something, anything, that would alleviate that awful feeling of gnawing uncertainty.
Now, just for a few more minutes, let’s pause to think about how accepting we are of uncertainty in some aspects of our lives. We patiently wait in great uncertainty for 9 months to welcome our newborn into the world. We wait with acceptance for a storm to pass, for sourdough to rise (or not), for our name to be called in a waiting room.
We can pull this atrophied skill of staying in uncertainty from the back of our closets. It is more vital and valuable than ever. It never really went out of style. We just forgot how much better it feels to approach the daily rush of life with more patience and curiosity.
Brene Brown explains in her book, Strong Ground, that the ability to resist explaining away what we do not yet understand, is a core strength that would serve us well today. Everyday.
Renowned historians have been echoing this same sentiment for a few years now. They share that it takes 30 years or more for the full impact of world leaders and events to unfold and reveal their impact on humanity.
Michael Smerconish, American radio host, author and political commentator, often reminds his listeners to “wait for it”. He regularly tells folks to give any breaking news story at least 72 hours to fully develop before trying to make sense of it.
Even Daniel Kahneman, one of the world’s premier authorities on judgment, decision-making and behavioral economics, cautioned us against the incredibly naive view that “what you see is all there is”.
Wait for it — it unfolds slowly, over time. Begin to strengthen your ability to stay with uncertainty. There is an inner peace in it. There is so much in this world that we can’t control. Yet we can control our ability to accept reality and to give ourselves time to process and better understand the full scope and complexity of any breaking story.
John Keats, that remarkable and insightful young poet, left us a timeless tool he named “negative capability”. He wrote to his brothers to explain it:
“that is, when man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after facts and reason.”
We do irritably reach for facts and reason too soon. We have been conditioned to do so, for it keeps us churning in choppy waters, rather than allowing for the calm to return so that we can begin to see and think more clearly.
Put in the reps that will help you strengthen your staying power. When in doubt and uncertainty, give it some space. Remain curious and patient. Let things unfold in their time. Stay with uncertainty. It is not nearly as scary and impossible as you think.
