People think I'm good with uncertainty

People think I’m comfortable with uncertainty. That I thrive in ambiguity. I’ve heard it enough times that I want to write about it, because I think the notion is wrong.

When I was running my own little consulting company, people would say it all the time — “wow, you’re so good at uncertainty.” Or the other version: “oh my god, you’re so brave for doing this.” And every time, my honest reaction was: it’s not bravery. You just do the thing. Like — just do the thing. Because it never felt like uncertainty to me. Not because I’m wired differently, but because of how I think the whole thing works.

In my head, all of life is creating rules out of uncertainty to give ourselves structure. That’s it. That’s what everyone is doing, all the time. You create the structures, you follow the structures, and you change the rules as needed. Because every rule is mostly a recommendation anyway — so you build the rules you need for the game you’re playing.

So that’s what I did. Granted, I had my safety nets — I’m not pretending I was walking a tightrope with nothing under me. But things never felt uncertain because I was busy building the certainty: okay, I give myself this much time. I have this much runway. This is the plan. If it doesn’t work, here’s what I do instead. If new information comes in, I pivot. Once that structure existed, where exactly was the uncertainty supposed to live? Every branch had an answer.

That’s why choosing to work for myself for those few years never felt like a leap. There was never that fear of “oh my god, what’s gonna happen?” It was just — you do it. I don’t think I worried about it. Genuinely.

And here’s the part I’m still turning over. Sometimes I think I should have felt that fear more. Maybe not worrying was immaturity — and maybe I’m still immature, because I still feel that way sometimes. The no-fear thing hasn’t fully worn off, and I honestly can’t tell you whether that’s a strength I should trust or a blind spot I haven’t paid for yet.

I don’t know. Just a thought I keep coming back to: it was never that I was good at uncertainty. It’s that I never let it stay uncertain for long.