By Dan Prendergast, M.A.
Part of the human condition is figuring out what our place in the world will be. At different stages of life people commonly wonder if they should have a child, go to college, pursue a certain occupation, start a business, move, begin or end a relationship, or make any number of other decisions. Sometimes these decisions are associated with relatively little stress, but many times these major life decisions are daunting and difficult. It is very common to invoke concepts such as fate, destiny, or the “one true path” that a person is meant to take, which in my opinion probably serves to amplify stress by increasing the stakes of a certain situation. If one assumes that there is one and only one true path that leads to happiness, prestige, fulfillment and financial reward, it is understandable that the prospect of not discovering it or failing to achieve it is anxiety provoking. I think that it is possible to decrease this existential anxiety by taking a good hard look at the problematic idea of a one true path, using weather forecasting as a helpful metaphor.
First, research suggests that people tend to overestimate the effects of adversity on their long-term happiness. While many people think that serious setbacks will result in long-term misery, research suggests that people who are dealing with serious adversities tend to have a period of difficulty, but frequently regain a sense of contentment and happiness after a period of adjustment. The takeaway point is that while you might encounter setbacks, in the long-term you will probably be about as happy as you are now, if not happier. If you are caught in the rain without an umbrella you may get soaked, but you will eventually dry off, and should not draw the conclusion that it will rain for the rest of your life.
We may worry about making the “right decision,” which implies that a right decision will guarantee a good outcome, and that a wrong decision will guarantee a poor outcome. Believing in the “right decision” is problematic because it assumes that one can know what the future outcome of a present decision will be. The unfortunate fact is that there are no guarantees in life, and we cannot always know exactly what the outcomes of our decisions will be. Perhaps the best thing that we can do is make decisions that carry the highest probability of a good outcome given available information, work hard, and hope for good luck. Some people don’t bring an umbrella despite a forecast of rain and stay dry, while some people bring their umbrella and fall in a puddle (still, best to bring the umbrella).
I think that the one true path is a compelling but problematic idea that is probably perpetuated by the way we look at other people who may have found their own path to happiness and fulfillment. These people probably did not have psychic powers to predict the future, but instead made a series of decisions under uncertain conditions, worked towards their goals, had some degree of luck, and ultimately saw a good outcome. When we look at the path these people took with hindsight, it is tempting to draw the conclusion that they knew what their path was all along by focusing on their personal story and not the uncertainty that characterized their decisions along the way. Comparing your difficulty predicting tomorrow’s weather with the historical track record of the most successful meteorologists is comparing apples to oranges.
In sum, planning for your future is similar to predicting weather in that the further into the future you try to forecast, the less certain you can be. For instance, I know a fair amount about what I’m doing tomorrow, but extraordinarily little about where I’ll be in two or ten years. If I were so inclined I could tell a story where every move I made was a deliberate decision and all of my good outcomes were planned perfectly. This would be an exercise in spin that might make me seem like I was on a straight and well defined path, driven by destiny. The reality is that most of my decisions were made under a great deal of uncertainty, I worked hard towards a set of goals that developed as I played to my strengths, and I had a healthy dose of help, guidance and luck. I suspect that most other humans without magical psychic powers take a similarly winding road.