In Embracing Uncertainty, Susan wrote about three realities of “uncertainty.” The first is,
The only certainty is that life is uncertain!
The following is an excerpt that explains this first “Reality of Certainty”:
On a very deep level of your being, you want guarantees. Isn’t that true? You want a promise that life will give you a happy marriage, lots of money, vigorous health, well-behaved, happy children, a world without conflict…or whatever it is for you. If you truly believed that life is uncertain, you wouldn’t be looking for any guarantees; you would be looking for something else.
Again, and I can’t repeat it often enough, the reality is that there is never a way to erase the uncertainty in any area of our lives. Name it, and it is uncertain. We could cry, scream, and be angry about this, but nothing is going to change the fact that, even if we do our very best, we cannot predict or control, even the next second of our lives, let alone anything else.
So now take a deep breath and SURRENDER to the fact that you can control NOTHING when it comes to the future. To help you accept this reality, you need to say to yourself over and over again,
I have no control over the future
I have no control over the future
I have no control over the future
Believe it or not, you will soon come to realize that the “negative” statement is a very positive affirmation!* As you repeat this affirmation over and over again, you will consciously LET GO of any hope that you can create any certainty in your life. This sounds like bad news, but it truly isn’t.
(*Susan endorsed creating affirmations that are best stated as a positive rather than a negative. This was one of her exceptions to that rule.)