Embracing Uncertainty

I was chatting with Coco's godmother on the phone the other day and I explained to her that I knew, already, before boarding the plane, that I'm not going to return from Zurich with any sort of clarity or closure. Life just doesn't work that way. "Of course not!" was her emphatic reply, "Don't put that kind of pressure on your trip and on yourself. You'll just ruin it," which is exactly true. And I'm not just ruining the trip with that kind of unrealistic expectation for clarity, I'm ruining my life. How can I enjoy the trip to Zurich if I place that kind of expectation on it? And how can I enjoy this chapter in Spokane if I'm focused too much on where we're going, especially if I don't even know where we're going?! We cannot know where we are going. We can set our mark and work toward it, but life is fluid and ever-changing and, honestly, I kind of hate that.

Then, I saw this article in the New York Times about forgiving mistakes and embracing uncertainty. This really stuck out for me:

"As is often the case, it is very easy to look backward and make up stories about why certain things happened and then take either the blame or the credit for them. The reality of life is often a bit more nuanced. As I carefully reflect on the good and the bad experiences, I have come to the conclusion that, in both cases, I was simply doing the best I could with the knowledge and experience I had at the time."

Can we ever do anything more than our best with the knowledge and experience we have at the time? No, we cannot. So instead of answering all of life's burning questions and correcting the poor decisions of the past, I'm just going to go to Zurich, get some really great knowledge to catapult my freelance career to the next level, enjoy being with friends, introduce Theo to everyone who knew him only as a bump, soak up everything I love about that city, and leave not knowing what's going to happen or where we'll be in two years or five years. I think I can do this. 5:45 am flight tomorrow. Wish me luck. xo

Zurich photo via Pinterest