Are you uncomfortable living with uncertainty? You want to know what happens next and when. If you can’t get answers, you feel anxious, frustrated, and powerless as to what’s next.
Losing our sense of control is not pleasant but much of life is uncertain. We’re amidst a pandemic and not sure how it will all unfold. We enter a new relationship and don’t know if it’ll work out. We take a class without knowing if we’ll like it. If we don’t keep moving forward, in spite of our discomfort, we can become immobilized, which stifles our growth and potential.
But not knowing what to expect is tough. Our human nature wants security and safety. Anything that challenges our comfort, can threaten us. At times, though, we need to push past our fears into the unknown otherwise live with regret. For instance, people who start a business have to be okay with not knowing if it will be successful. They take a leap of faith, believing in their skills, the product or services salability, and their sheer perseverance to make it work. If the business fails, they can at least say they tried.
Accepting uncertainty means giving up control of the outcome. We are, however, always in control of our emotions and behavior and our overall ability to cope well with uncertainty.
Here are 17 uncertainty quotes to help you better embrace the unknown:
1. “If uncertainty is unacceptable to you, it turns into fear. If it is perfectly acceptable, it turns into increased aliveness, alertness, and creativity.” ~Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
2. “Uncertainty and mystery are energies of life. Don’t let them scare you unduly, for they keep boredom at bay and spark creativity.” ~R. I. Fitzhenry
3. “I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity.” ~Gilda Radner, It’s Always Something
4. “Looking deeper, we could say that the real cause of suffering is not being able to tolerate uncertainty—and thinking that it’s perfectly sane, perfectly normal, to deny the fundamental groundlessness of being human.” ~Pema Chödrön, Living Beautifully
5. “Let go of certainty. The opposite isn’t uncertainty. It’s openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow.” ~Tony Schwartz
6. “The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.” ~Erich Fromm, Man for Himself
7. “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” ~Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet
8. “For my part, I know nothing with any certainty, but the sight of the stars, makes me dream.” ~Vincent Van Gogh
9. “Nobody knows how things will turn out, that’s why they go ahead and play the game…You give it your all and sometimes amazing things happen, but it’s hardly ever what you expect.” ~Gennifer Choldenko, Al Capone Does My Shirts
10. “Embrace relational uncertainty. It’s called romance. Embrace spiritual uncertainty. It’s called mystery. Embrace occupational uncertainty. It’s called destiny. Embrace emotional uncertainty. It’s called joy. Embrace intellectual uncertainty. It’s called revelation.” ~Mark Batterson, In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars
11. “A cheerful readiness is what seems honest now, facing an uncertain future with humor, grace and dignity.” ~Marty Rubin
12. “The uncertainties of life will attempt to throw you off balance. Make peace with it, and the scale will tip back in your favor.” ~Christine E. Szymanski
13. “There are a few times in life when you leap up and the past that you’d been standing on falls away behind you, and the future you mean to land on is not yet in place, and for a moment you’re suspended knowing nothing and no one, not even yourself.” ~Ann Patchett, The Dutch House
14. “Your first enemy, your biggest enemy, is the person who shook your certainty.” ~Meir Ezra
15. “Change is always tough. Even for those who see themselves as agents of change, the process of starting a new thing can cause times of disorientation, uncertainty and insecurity.” ~Joyce Meyer
16. “Faith means living with uncertainty―feeling your way through life, letting your heart guide you like a lantern in the dark.” ~Dan Millman
17. “The quality of your life is in direct proportion to the amount of uncertainty you can comfortably deal with.” ~Tony Robbins
Which one of these uncertainty quotes resonate with you and why? Please let us know in the comments below. We’d love to hear from you!
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