What To Do When You Don't Know What To Do
I've been meaning to send out a newsletter for months now, but I haven't felt like I've had anything good to offer you.
And by good, I mean the best, wittiest, most fun, most transformational, most inspiring newsletter you ever read in your whole dang life. A newsletter that would change your thinking, help you create new habits, motivate you like never before, deliver epiphanies, realize your greatest dreams!
I was thinking my newsletter had to be all those things, while at the same time knowing that there's no way I (or anyone?) could write that particular life-changing newsletter. And I reminded myself that that’s not really the purpose of this newsletter. It’s really just to remind people who have signed up for it that I (and my services as a coach) exist (you know, marketing). And maybe, if I’m lucky, have something I write here resonate with you.
Then I did what I often do what I can't find a way forward—I got still and had a chat with myself while I was flossing my teeth. I acknowledged that I didn’t know what to write about and I asked myself what do I do when I don't know what to do? And my mind answered back immediately, write about that.
That brought me back to a thing I tell my clients all the time (and that I’ve written about before): Much of the time, we know what to do. Even when we search our minds for the answer and come up blank. Even when it feels like the answer has to be somewhere outside of us, with some expert or at the end of some long course of study. Even then, we probably know, or at least have a hunch we can follow that might get us closer to knowing what to do.
We are pretty wise beings if we take the time to listen to ourselves.
How do I know this? Because for eight years now, I've seen it happen over and over again with my clients.
They tell me, I don't know what to do about _______, and then I ask them something like, well, what *do* you know about _______? and they'll proceed to tell me many things they know about it, and pretty soon, they have figured out what they want to do.
All that knowing was just right there, waiting for them to discover it.
So often, our knowing is obscured by our need to get it right, to be exceptional, to not flub up. It gets hidden from us by fear, shame, shoulds. The part of us that wants to ward off regret, judgement, punishment—that part can't hear the part of us that knows the way forward.
A few years ago, during a session with a client—let’s call her Dolly—we got to a point in our conversation where her answer to every one of my questions was, I don't know.
I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.
I don’t expect my clients to have answers all the time—we leave plenty of space to explore the unknown—but if I don't know is the answer to a bunch of questions in a row, that’s my cue to try something different. So, I asked Dolly if she'd be willing to try something. She said okay. I said, I’d like you to stand up, plant your feet solidly on the ground, raise your arms up in front of you like a boxer, and I want you to start throwing punches and just keep going. There was some giggling, but she started moving. And as she was boxing the air in front of her, I asked the same questions I'd asked earlier and those I don't knows became concise, clear answers. There was no hesitating, no, well, maybe it’s this or maybe it’s that. She knew. She just needed to stop consciously thinking about the answers and let them come from somewhere else.
It was pretty cool.
(George Saunders talks about letting our subconscious mind guide us in one of his recent Story Club newsletters. It’s awesome. And in a NYT podcast episode from earlier this summer, host Ezra Klein talks to Annie Murphy Paul, the author of The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain about “how we can tap the intelligence that exists beyond our brains—in our bodies, our surroundings, and our relationships.”)
Next time you're at a loss and you don’t know what to do, try this and see what happens:
Check in with yourself while you’re doing an activity that doesn’t require a lot of brain space. Try something like flossing your teeth, walking the dog, going for a bike ride, scrubbing the bathtub, doodling in a notebook, sweeping the floor—just make it something you don’t really have to think about while you do it.
As you are putting your body through the motions of said activity, let your mind wander to the thing you’re unsure about. Ask yourself some of these questions and see what comes:
What do I know about this?
What am I confused about? Worried about? Conflicted about? Scared of?
If a friend of mine came to me with this same conundrum, what would I tell them?
If there was no right answer, what would I do?
What does my gut (or spirit, or soul, or being, etc.) have to say about this?
What would an older, wiser me do about this?
What would [name person you admire a lot] do in this situation? (I usually wonder what Frances McDormand would do, she always gives me the best advice.)
All this is to say: sometimes loosening your mind’s grip on figuring things out and coming at it from a different direction can help. And if this doesn’t work the first time you try it, keep at it. It may take some practice to begin to listen to yourself in a new way.
But take comfort in the fact that there’s a part of you that knows what’s best for you (for you, being the key).
You might not love what you hear. It might mean you have to have a tough conversation, or leave a situation that isn’t working, or do something that feels hard. But the part of you that came up with the idea likely really wants or needs you to do that thing.
This originally appeared in my Winter 2022 email newsletter. To get on the list and receive this and other goodies in your inbox from time to time, sign up at the bottom of the home page pamdaghlian.com .