Uncertainty Is A Good Gift With Bad Wrapping Paper

Brazen Careerist: The New Rules for Success
By Penelope Trunk

(Page 2 of 3)

If you could see a movie of your life before you lived it, would you want to live it? Probably not. The thrill of living is that you don't know what's coming. In other words, uncertainty is what makes our lives fun.

Sure, it's hard to see uncertainty in such a positive light when you're out of work, or when you feel like you're flailing. But uncertainty is really another word for opportunity, and you can't harness an opportunity until you recognize it's there.

When Allison graduated from Harvard, she had opportunities all over the place and no idea what she wanted to do. She took a job in consulting but she knew she wouldn't stay there. She took the GRE and scored so high that she was able to supplement her income by tutoring students at Stanley Kaplan. Still, she didn't think she wanted to go to graduate school. Allison knew she wasn't doing what she wanted, but she didn't know what she wanted.

She worried. All her friends were going to graduate school or starting their own businesses. She was lost and panicking that she would never figure anything out. She wasn't even living in a city she planned to stay in, but she couldn't figure out where to go.

After six years, reality set in. Many of her friends who went directly to professional school had crises when they graduated because they weren't sure if they had picked the right profession. And Allison, by going with the flow and having a general plan in mind, got married, moved to the Midwest, and leveraged her consulting experience to get a great position at a foundation she is very happy with and where her job is to dole out money to nonprofits.

In hindsight, Allison realizes that her years spent being lost were actually just a period during which she was finding her way: time well spent, and time we must all take if we're being honest with ourselves.

The only way to lead an interesting life is to encounter uncertainty and make a choice. Otherwise your life is not your own - it is a path someone else has chosen. Moments of uncertainty are when you create your life, when you become who you are.

Uncertainty usually begins with a job hunt, but it doesn't end there. Every new role we take on means another round of instability. Instead of fearing it, here are some new approaches to dealing with uncertainty:

Accept uncertainty instead of fighting it. Some of you work for unstable companies, or hold tenuous positions at stable companies, or have no idea where you will go next. If you can focus in the face of instability, you are more likely to be able to leverage opportunity.

The best way to focus is to gain a better understanding of what you want and what you can control in order to achieve your goal. Maybe you don't know exactly what you want, but no one ever has all the information they need. Paul Stevens trains career coaches and one of the topics he spends the most time on is how to teach people to deal with uncertainty in their career. "The more information you have, the more you realize you don't know. The key is to accept this, but not be paralyzed by it. Not knowing for certain opens opportunities for new knowledge, new career options, being free to invent your own career future."

You should be focused and flexible about what you want for yourself. "Treat your career goals as a hypothesis and balance time spent achieving your goals with time spent discovering them," advises Stevens.

Prepare for uncertainty. The most extreme example of this preparation is in Pema Chödrön's writings on accepting uncertainty (see, for example, Comfortable with Uncertainty: 108 Teachings on Cultivating Fearlessness and Compassion). Chödrön, a Tibetan monk who lives in Canada, recommends that people spend their lives coping with uncertainty - through meditation, yoga, and self-knowledge, preferably at a monastery. Probably you will not do this, but you can follow her advice in principle: face the fact that uncertainty is difficult and that you are at least a little anxious. As Chödrön would say, just be with that, since you can't change it.

Most of us will not have honed meditation as a coping tool, but there are other tools that can help you when instability hits your career. Building a network, saving money, being very good at something, and continuing to learn - these are all ways you can make yourself more prepared for uncertain times because you'll have more flexibility in your approach to dealing with instability.

Use uncertainty to make yourself shine. For those of you who have no idea what to do next in your life, remember that uncertainty is what allows you to surprise yourself. If you could see each future step along the way, you'd never get the chance to be amazed at what you can do.

When I graduated from college, I went on to play professional beach volleyball. At the time I worried that the decision was crazy and that I wouldn't make the cut, but in the face of massive instability, beach volleyball seemed like a reasonable choice. Now it is one of the parts of my life I am most proud of.

Create uncertainty. Some of you are stuck in your career. The only way to get unstuck is to create instability. Say to yourself, "Maybe I can change my approach, maybe I can find a new specialty." In the face of a mortgage or a waning 401(k), creating instability seems absurd. But think of it another way: uncertainty is really another word for opportunity, and each of us should take responsibility for creating our own opportunities.

If you can see your life in front of you, you've got a problem. If you know what's coming, then you probably won't need to grow to deal with it. If you can see everything coming, then what is the challenge? You're on autopilot. And who wants that for a life? So embrace instability. This is where you make your life your own.

Copyright © 2007 by Penelope Trunk

About the Author

Penelope Trunk writes career advice for a new generation of workers. She explains why old advice - like pay your dues, climb the ladder, and don't have gaps in your resume - is outdated and irrelevant in today's workplace. She has a reputation for giving advice that is counterintuitive but effective, like take long lunches, ignore people who steal your ideas, and stop vying for a promotion.