“So what’s your five-year plan?” The question arrives at every networking event, every family gathering, every job interview. There’s an expected answer: clear, confident, detailed. You’re supposed to know exactly where you’re headed and exactly how you’ll get there. But what if the honest answer is simply “I don’t know”? What if the future is genuinely foggy, the path genuinely unclear, and you’re figuring it out as you go? Our culture treats this admission like failure, like you’re behind or unprepared or lost. But what if being in the space of not knowing is actually exactly where you need to be?
Dr. Jamie Holmes, author of “Nonsense: The Power of Not Knowing,” spent years researching how people relate to ambiguity and uncertainty. His findings challenge the assumption that certainty is always better. People who can tolerate ambiguity, who can sit in “I don’t know” without immediately grabbing for premature answers, are more creative, more successful at complex problem-solving, and more resilient when circumstances change. The capacity to hold uncertainty isn’t weakness. It’s a skill that allows for genuine discovery rather than the performance of knowledge you don’t actually have.
The Trap of Performed Certainty
We’ve been trained to believe that having it all figured out is a virtue. School taught us there’s a right answer, and you should know it or fail. Career advice tells us to have a clear trajectory, to ladder up, to plan ahead. Social media shows us curated lives that appear to follow clear, confident paths. Family members ask “what are you doing with your life?” as if you should know with certainty. But here’s what this pressure misses: the most interesting lives aren’t always the most planned ones. They’re often the ones where people stayed open enough to what was actually unfolding that they could change course when something true appeared.
The pressure to have everything figured out creates a particular kind of suffering: the suffering of pretending. Performing certainty you don’t feel. Defending plans you’re not sure about. Staying on paths that stopped fitting just to avoid admitting you don’t know where you’re going. Every person you admire has pivoted, changed course, discovered something unexpected, admitted they were wrong, started over. The difference is they eventually stopped pretending they always knew the way. Carol Dweck’s research on mindset at Stanford shows that people who can acknowledge what they don’t know, who stay in learning mode rather than performing mode, are more likely to actually grow and develop than those who feel they must appear competent at all times. If you’re navigating this kind of transition, our piece on quarter-life breakthroughs offers perspective on embracing these shifts.
What “I Don’t Know” Actually Means
When you say “I don’t know,” you’re not saying you’re lost and helpless. You’re saying you’re open to what’s unfolding. You’re not saying you’re failing at life. You’re refusing to fake certainty you don’t feel. You’re not saying you don’t care about your future. You’re saying you care enough to be honest about where you actually are rather than where you think you should be. “I don’t know” isn’t the absence of something. It’s the presence of openness, honesty, and intellectual humility, qualities that psychological research consistently links to better outcomes in complex, changing environments.
Think about the moments in your life when you changed the most, when you learned something genuinely new, when you became someone different. Were those moments of clarity and certainty? Or were they moments of confusion, disorientation, and not knowing? Growth happens in the space of uncertainty. When you’re certain, you stop exploring. When you admit you don’t know, you start. The discomfort of uncertainty isn’t a problem to solve but a signal you’re in the growth zone, the place where learning becomes possible because you’ve stopped defending what you already think you know.
The Art of Exploring Without Deciding
Most of us never learned how to explore without immediately needing to decide. We think exploration should quickly lead to answers, to commitments, to plans. But what if exploration is valuable in itself? What if giving yourself permission to try things without committing forever is exactly what you need? Try things because you’re curious, not because you’re certain they’ll work out. Pay attention to what energizes you, not what impresses others or what you think you should want. Notice what you’re naturally drawn to: the articles you read, the conversations that engage you, the problems you want to solve. These are clues worth following, even if they don’t yet add up to a clear plan.
Psychologist Todd Kashdan, who researches curiosity and wellbeing at George Mason University, has found that curiosity is a better predictor of life satisfaction than certainty about the future. People who approach life with curiosity, who ask questions they don’t yet know the answers to, report higher wellbeing than those who need to have everything figured out. Give yourself seasons of exploration. “I’m spending this year exploring X” is a valid answer. You don’t need to know where it leads to make it worthwhile. For more on navigating identity during periods of change, see our piece on identity transformation.
Permission to Change Your Mind
Here’s radical permission: what you wanted five years ago doesn’t have to be what you want now. The job that was perfect at 25 can feel suffocating at 35. The city you loved can stop fitting. The goals you had can stop mattering. You’re allowed to change, not just your circumstances but your mind, your desires, your direction. The stories we tell ourselves about changing course often make it feel shameful. “If I change direction, all that time was wasted.” Actually, all that time taught you what you needed to know to make this change. Nothing is wasted if you learned from it. “People will think I don’t know what I’m doing.” People are too busy worrying about their own lives to judge yours as much as you fear. “I should have it figured out by now.” Says who? There’s no rulebook that specifies when you’re supposed to have certainty.
The poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote about living the questions themselves, being patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and trying to love the questions rather than suffering through them while waiting for answers. This isn’t passive acceptance but active engagement with uncertainty as a creative space rather than a problem. When someone asks your plan and you genuinely don’t have one, try: “I’m exploring a few different directions right now. Ask me again in six months.” Not apologetic. Simply clear about where you are. If you’re considering a major career shift during this period, our piece on career pivots after 40 shows that reinvention is possible at any stage.
The Clarity That Arrives Unforced
Here’s the paradox Holmes and other researchers have observed: when you stop forcing certainty, genuine clarity often arrives. Not because you stopped caring about direction, but because you created space for your actual truth to emerge rather than your performed truth. Forced clarity is what you think you should want, what looks good, what makes sense to others. Earned clarity is what’s actually true for you, what you’re genuinely drawn to, what actually fits your life and values and temperament. The second kind takes longer. It requires tolerating the discomfort of not knowing. But it’s worth waiting for because it’s actually yours.
When you’re comfortable with “I don’t know,” pivoting becomes possible. Pivoting isn’t failing; it’s incorporating new information. It’s staying aligned with who you’re becoming rather than who you used to be. Every successful person has pivoted, often multiple times. They just don’t always advertise it. The founder who changed business models three times before something worked wasn’t chaotic; they were learning. The writer who moved from journalism to marketing to novels wasn’t unfocused; they were evolving. The person who thought they wanted partnership and house and kids and discovered they wanted solo travel and freedom wasn’t selfish; they were honest.
Your Invitation
You don’t have to have it figured out. Not now. Not by any particular age. Not ever, if that’s what’s true for you. You’re allowed to explore without committing, to try without deciding, to change your mind, to pivot, to not know. “I don’t know” isn’t a confession of failure. It’s a declaration of honesty. And in a world of performed certainty and filtered perfection, honesty is revolutionary. The next time someone asks what you’re doing with your life and the honest answer is “I don’t know,” try saying it out loud. “I don’t know. I’m figuring it out.” Notice how free that feels. The most interesting paths are the ones discovered, not planned. Give yourself permission to discover.
Sources: Jamie Holmes’ “Nonsense: The Power of Not Knowing,” Carol Dweck’s mindset research (Stanford), Todd Kashdan’s curiosity studies, Rainer Maria Rilke.
