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Attempts to control every variable in life are bound to fail.

Good decision-making doesn't always equal good outcomes.

Being flexible, trusting one's own decisions, and responding to fallout are good ways to manage uncertainty.

Anxious people try to control uncertainty.

Because many real-life scenarios, especially important ones, contain irreducible uncertainty, that strategy can fall apart. But there are specific lessons we can learn to handle this reality.

This post is for people who:

Respond to bad outcomes by auditing what they should've done differently

Equate "it went wrong" with "I messed up"

Over-prepare as a way to manage anxiety, and then feel betrayed if their effort doesn't pay off

Let me tell you a story that illustrates typical thinking patterns and rebuttals.

Here's what happened: My car engine died. Cars are not my forte, but my mechanic neighbor had a spare car he'd purchased at auction and was fixing up to sell. I'd need to wait a week for him to finish the repairs, and then I could buy it.

I rented a car for a week, and did everything I could to make the process of purchasing the new one go smoothly, but it didn't.

Lesson 1: Many Situations Contain Irreducible Uncertainty

I tried to control as many variables as I could to ensure a good outcome. But, on the morning I was supposed to complete the purchase, my neighbor told me he'd found additional........

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