Living With Fear and Uncertainty

 

“Knowledge is the knowing that we cannot know.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson--“Montaigne; or, the Skeptic”

 

Ralph Waldo Emerson would have made a great Zen poet.  He lived through the Civil War, a time when America’s future was anything but certain.  He also survived the early deaths of his father and his first wife.

As a student, he showed little promise and graduated near the bottom of his class at Harvard Divinity School.  He was described at the time as “tubercular, restless, and already questioning the religion” he was studying.  It was after his wife’s death that he quit the ministry and pursued his life of the mind.

The rest, as they say, is history.  His collected writings run to forty volumes, and he is considered the father of Transcendentalism and American philosophy.

Sometimes, the smartest thing to do is admit your own ignorance.  Begin in humility to learn, to study, to be open to the world.  As Emerson can attest, it is a beautiful life in all its sadness and joy.

 

“When inspiration has become hidden, when we feel ready to give up, this is the time when healing can be found in the tenderness of pain itself…A warrior accepts that we can never know what will happen to us next…But the truth is that we can never avoid uncertainty.  This not knowing is part of the adventure.  It is also what makes us afraid.”

Pema Chodron--Comfortable With Uncertainty (Shambhala, 2003)

 

Chodron is a rarity:  an American Buddhist nun.  She lives and teaches in the cold and beautiful isolation of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.

Our journey in life is always fraught with uncertainty.  Push on and persevere; since not knowing is our constant companion, let go of fear and trepidation.  It is in the midst of uncertainty that the interesting stuff happens.  See this period of change as an opportunity to grow and find wisdom.  Never fear the better you to come.

 

“We fear many things.  We fear illness and death.  We fear losing our job or falling into poverty.  We fear change—a new career, a new home, a new marriage.  We may fear being alone, or we may fear other people.  And then there is the fear of not being accepted by others—by our families and friends, our colleagues and neighbors, by society at large…fear is a tremendous and complicated power.  It is silent yet devastating, leading to anxiety and ultimately, depression.  When you are consumed by fear, your judgment is distorted; you become frozen by doubt, unable to make the simplest decision.”

Simon Jacobson--Toward a Meaningful Life:  The Wisdom of the Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson (Harper Perennial, 2004)

 

Jacobson’s writing comes from the wisdom of a revered figure, Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson.  His work resonates far beyond the constructs of Judaism.

Cast your fate to the wind.  Let it go, let it fly.  The engine of your intellect is fired by imagination in the face of fear and uncertainty.

There is a quote, attributed to multiple thinkers and passed around social media and into at least one film:  “Things will be all right in the end, and if they are not all right, it is not the end.”

Embrace fear.

Embrace uncertainty.

Live large.