Living In the "I don't know"

I had a writing client, Laura, who considered herself an expert in relationships. She and her husband, Brian, led three day workshops and the two of them were so in synch, it was enviable. Their focus was on hanging in there and learning the communication skills to stay together at all odds. They came up with exercises that would show people how to be kind to themselves and have compassion for their spouses. They talked about eliminating competitive attitudes and listening to each other. They were the envy of couples as they told personal stories about their connection and how their marriage was running smoothly.

They had an aggressive PR firm who successfully attracted new participants all the time and they were thriving – until Brian left Laura for a younger woman. A short time later, he wrote a book that became an international bestseller. When Laura came to me to write her own book, she said she was happy for Brian but her eyes said something different. I agreed to help her and during the interviews, I found out that she’d had five husbands and she was closing in on number six. She said that things had been off for a long time with Brian and she was glad to be free. I asked her how that fit in to what they had been teaching and she skirted the issue. She said that no matter what was going on, she knew a great deal about coupling because she’d had so many husbands.

During our time together she gave me a lot of unsolicited advice. She just couldn’t accept the fact that she didn’t know everything and she might be the one who needed to learn a few things. At the time, a popular formula for a talk show was having a group of couples on the stage and an expert in the audience. That was Laura. As they kept asking her questions and sat on bated breath for the answers, I felt sorry for her. What a burden it must be to know everything and never be able to say, “Let me think about that,” or “I don’t know.”

The “I don’t know” space is very hard for us humans. We want assurances about what to do, what our future will be and exact directions on how to get there. But life doesn’t work that way. It takes surprising turns and it takes a lot of maturity, trust and humility to be able to say, “I don’t know,” and soften into that reality.

When I was younger I thought that when I got older, I would know the answers to the things I wasn’t sure about. But that idea was extinguished when I got older and it felt like I knew less than when I was young. As we move through these difficult times when it seems like all is lost, one of the things that gets me through is to know that I don’t know what’s going to happen. It could be good or bad. It could appear bad but be good and vice versa. That’s a hard place to be, but thinking I know what’s going to happen next is worse. Pema Chodron advises us that allowing room for not knowing is a most important lesson. We just never know if this is the beginning of the story or the middle or the end. It might be the beginning of a great adventure and the end of a great love, all at the same time. The thing is that we really don’t know. The only way to carry on in that amorphous state is let things happen and be curious.

I see the “I don’t know,” as a place of surrender. There is a Taoist story about an old farmer who had worked his land for many years. One day his horse ran away. His neighbors gathered and said to the old man, “That’s such bad luck.”

“Maybe,” the farmer said. “I don’t know.”

The next morning the horse returned, bringing with it three other wild horses. The neighbors said, “How wonderful.”

“Maybe,” the farmer said. “I don’t know.”

The following day, his son tried to ride one of the untamed horses. He was thrown and broke his leg. The neighbors said, “What a misfortune.”

“Maybe,” the farmer said. “I don’t know.”

The day after, military officials came to the village to draft young men into the army. Seeing that the son’s leg was broken, they passed him by. The neighbors said, “Your son doesn’t have to risk dying. Things have turned out so well for you.”

“Maybe,” the farmer said. “I don’t know.”

Since we don’t know the ultimate reality of anything, it would be a idea to stop telling ourselves stories. We are prone to tell ourselves stories with sad endings rather than happy ones, but either way, they are just stories and our lives would be more uncomplicated and less painful if we stayed in the “I don’t know.”

I often go back to a piece of wisdom that my friend Bethany told me. Ram Dass once said, “I’ve been asked many times if this is the Aquarian age and it’s all just beginning, or if it’s Armageddon and this is the end. I don’t know, but whatever it is, my work is the same: to quiet my mind, open my heart, and relieve suffering wherever I find it.”

It sounds so simple but it takes a lot of discipline to be there. Socrates said, “The only true wisdom is knowing you know nothing.”