As a kid, I was convinced that I wanted to be a quirky primary school teacher, just like my dad. Then, as I grew older, I wanted to be a theatrical designer, and finally an “edgy” librarian.
In truth, I ended up as none of those things and wound up doing something I never planned or expected: creating this website, lonerwolf, and guiding people through the awakening journey.
But here’s a secret. Now that I’m in my mid-ish thirties, I still don’t always know what to do with my life.
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“But you run this website!” you might protest. Well, yes. I do.
However, the reality is that I frequently feel lost, unsure of where to guide this work next, and at times empty and uninspired.
In fact, I have literally gone years sometimes just throwing stuff out there and hoping it sticks or makes some kind of legible sense.
At the end of the day, I believe uncertainty is part of what it means to be human.
Can you relate?
If you struggle with the sense that you don’t know what to do with your life, you’re not the only one.
This feeling can stir up some pretty disturbing feelings of existential dread, anxiety, confusion, and fear that maybe “you’re wasting your life” or whittling away your time meaninglessly.
Having no idea what to do with our life can make us feel like failures and imposters pretending to have it all together externally while feeling internally messy.
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But here’s the thing: I believe having no idea what to do with your life is actually a good thing when embraced with open arms.
Strangely, accepting your feelings of “I don’t know what to do with my life” actually leads to the solution itself and the path that is uniquely yours.
Table of contents
Why Having No Idea What to Do With Your Life is Actually a Good Thing
People, chained to monotony, afraid to think, clinging to certainties … they live like ants. – Bela Lugosi
I’m going to make a wild statement here:
Certainty is the death of creativity, curiosity, and innovation.
We’re taught that we “should” know what to do with our lives. But why? Why should we know what to “do” with our lives?
Shouldn’t life be an adventure, rather than a steady monotonous march to our graves?
If you have no idea what to do with your life, count yourself lucky. You aren’t deadened by a belief, an ideal, or a dogma. You are fresh, free, and available to new possibilities.
Having “it all figured out” not only makes you rigid and crusty like stale bread, but it’s also positively stupid.
As philosopher Bertrand Russell once wrote,
One of the painful things about our time is that those who feel certainty are stupid, and those with any imagination and understanding are filled with doubt and indecision.
Moving on, let me summarise this all in a few bite-sized reflections:
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- Knowing something with certainty typically makes you rigid, closed off to new ideas, and therefore uncreative.
- Feeling lost and adrift in life helps you to become open and receptive to fresh information, increasing your creativity.
- Not knowing what to do with your life breaks you out of old patterns and keeps you humble.
In the words of psychoanalyst Erich Fromm, “Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.”
We are living in the age of the creator, and not knowing what to do with your life is a prerequisite for sharing something meaningful with the world – take it from someone who has been doing this for 12+ years.
The Mind Tries to Figure Out “What to Do” With Life, The Soul Trusts and Opens
It’s normal to think to yourself, “I don’t know what to do with my life,” and to despair that there’s no clear path or answer.
It’s maddening, isn’t it, trying to figure it all out?
This is the mind at work, frantically scrambling to make things follow a logical structure, make sense, and control the uncontrollable current of life.
You may find that just when you’ve caught on to “The Answer,” something else unexpected crashes into your life and throws you back to square one again.
Don’t worry about any of this mental struggle. It’s normal. Just recognize that, in the words of philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.
Your mind will never come to a satisfactory conclusion because the nature of the mind is to constantly have a problem to fix, a bone to chase, an unreachable horizon to pursue.
Instead, recognize that the state of ‘not-knowing’ allows you to tune into your heart’s wisdom rather than your mind’s projections.
Not-knowing – that is, stepping outside of thought and into the space of surrender to the Divine’s flow – is the path of creative success and life purpose.
Not-knowing allows you to taste the succulent sweetness of divine inspiration, which is what you’re really looking for deep down. You want to meaningfully give back to the world and make some kind of difference, right?
Divine inspiration is that which gives your life a direction based on energetic flow, not on mental “know” – that is, the mind’s tendency to try and “know-it-all” rather than trust in a greater intelligence.
A Simple Solution: Ask This One Powerful Question
As we’ve covered so far, when you feel lost and adrift in life, a powerful space within you opens to:
1. Become receptive to new ideas
2. Access more creative fluidity
3. Change old ingrained patterns
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4. Tune into your heart’s wisdom, not your mind’s projections
But how do you tune into your heart’s wisdom, your soul’s deeper truth?
I love this question posed by author Joseph Nguyen in Don’t Believe Everything You Think,
A question that greatly helps me to settle the thinking and tap into the limitless well of possibilities of what I could create is: “If I had infinite money, already traveled the world, had no fear, and didn’t receive any recognition for what I do, what would I do or what would I create?” Whenever we ask questions, answers always arise. It is impossible for our brains to hear a question and not come up with a response. So when you ask yourself this question, whatever begins to come up for you without any manual thinking will be from the divine and from inspiration versus desperation.
Take some time out to genuinely contemplate this question. Do this right now.
If your mind feels busy, return to this question later. But don’t avoid it. I find that it helps to visualize the question, then let the mind quiet and wait.
What came up for you? I’d love to hear.
Remember that trusting and opening to a state of not-knowing and embracing that you have no idea where your life is going is much healthier and saner than trying to “figure it all out,” have a “ten-step plan,” or be perfectly aligned with your goals one hundred percent of the time.
Trust in the flow and see where it takes you. Enjoy the ride and have fun. Having no idea what to do with your life is a good thing: it keeps you humble, open, and creative.
If you think of yourself as a seeker trying to connect to your soul’s deeper purpose, I’ve created the Spiritual Wanderer Course to support you. Every journey follows an archetypal pattern, and I help you tap into yours via three hours of audio-visual content, journals, a private test, and more. Check it out here!
That’s it for this week.
Until next time, keep embracing not-knowing. :)
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Thank you so much for the emails,this was exactly what i needed!! I have been struggling with this topic now for months and especially the past few weeks so i am so so grateful to have opened your email this morning, they seem to always come at the perfect times with exactly what I need, so greatful for you guys, your work is amazing!
I really appreciated reading this, thank you Brittany!
hey loved this weeks post – what would I create if all else had been achieved? It would be story books and animation for little kids but with real life topics and language to help them face the world and their deams early on. (I am already working on this concept).
I totally related to the ‘not knowing’ theme this week. I buy into the whole let it go ethos and see what the flow brings, by not having everything planned. My dilemma though is … I pull back from some potential new experiences and opportunities because they dont appear to just come along – they feel fabricated or subliminally and heavily influenced by a selection of other people in my life. This feels like letting go for someone else to take control of my life. So, thats my struggle.
Letting go needs to work alongside discernment and intuition, so I’m glad you picked that up James. Thank you for sharing!
I think I’d try to help others talk about their problems. I’d like to listen and help them come up with solutions instead of living in misery and pain
That is beautiful Robin 💜 I hope you pursue that! We need more of this kind of healing work in the world.
Hi,
I have struggled with this in past. It affects all decisions with any weight, not just career choices.
I would agree with the analysis here. Basically there is a lot of anxiety with some of us about doing the “wrong thing”. That anxiety can often dissolve by trying something and discovering it’s really wonderful.
In my case I have been trying to work to save biodiversity for a long time and finally decided togo to Costa Rica to help on a study of endangered parrots. It was very exciting.
I am going to go back on a different project. Maybe I’m doing the wrong thing but I an doing something good nevertheless.
The fact that you’re doing something good is the key here, regardless of whether the mind thinks it’s the right path or not. What does your heart feel? That’s the question to ask. Thank you Bill!
I grew up in a grammar school that had a candy store next door
(prime spot) and with my weekly allowance of .25 cents, I was in heaven. Now I want a candy store! Then after college I feel into the arena of “not knowing what to do in my life”. Graduating as a psychology major I was hired by McDonald’s (no degree necessary) and spent about 15 years ending up as a junior executive with 175 franchise stores. Then a “Spiritual hunch arrived”, my wife an I were going into the Chocolate business without knowing nothing about it. Now after 38 years we have had tremendous success in our Riverside Chocolate Factory…
Oh wow! That’s amazing Hippie Bob! I love working with the ‘spirit’ of cacao, such a beautiful grounding energy 💜
I found this really interesting & helpful. It’s something I’ve struggled with for a long time. After giving it some thought (& the key here for me was “no recognition”), what came up was I want to feel close to & connect with the earth. A Native American elder once told me to lay on the earth, that she’s my “mother” & she will heal me. I’m not sure what will come of all this, but I do know laying on the earth (for at least 20 minutes) calms me & grounds me. I’m trusting to be led to further adventures!
What a simple yet deep practice. Thank you for sharing this Susan, I hope amazing new paths open to you 💜
At this point in time I don’t know what to do with my life ,I’m stack in finding me and doing what will keep me going in life.im just swimming in circles going nowhere. But I will keep going with the flow to see ,where it will take me .growing up with career choices and end up not doing any of them is a curse, because I end up not knowing what to do and not being happy in the other environment. But so far I’m going with flow hope one day I will find my glow
I love this format. It’s no less informative, yet concise. I think it’s more intimate in
a way also. I ask myself the very same question every day. I wondered why I paid $40,000 for a Culinary Arts degree only to make cat toys!🙄
But damn are those cats happy little pusses 🙃
Thanks for sharing this Angela, I appreciate it and you!
I love this! Exactly what I am doing now. The key problem is to get out of my head and let myself be led by the soul urges, drop preconceptions and wants and needs. Just live the life. On the other hand, if I were filthy rich and could do anything, I would start getting people together in a loving way, doing soulwork to live more and fear less. But, it seems this is not my way, at least not now. That is ok with me. I am grateful for having been helped past the fear of the darkest shadows to see the light inherent in them. Lots of love and stamina to everyone❤️
Lots of love right back to you Nina 💜
I don’t know what to do with my Life Topic, an interesting read, reflects on my work situation at the moment reading this put so much into perspective for it’s not about work it was about me and what I need to do to move on the next stage of my life & work. So, thank you Aletheia for setting an article that I just bonded with the moment that I read it, Namaste Ed (Journey Within A Journey of Inner Peace)
I have found that, when I’m at a crossroads, it’s helpful to me to go help someone else. Perhaps this comes from a lifetime of teaching school; I’m in my 80’s now and tutoring kids and adults needing a GED. I loved the culinary school comment above. I took time off and spent an inheritance to attend art school. In addition to art, I learned self discipline and an acceptance of allowing the creative flow. Never had an art career but it’s never too late! I greatly enjoyed this read; it perculated a bunch of ideas in my mind. Thank you, your efforts are greatly appreciated.
Thank you Ed and Susan for these lovely comments 💜