Going to school, college, maybe even graduate school, getting a job, getting married — for some time, the road looks very signposted. It's clear what's next. Of course you go there.
But at some point, you run out of road.
Your job feels dissatisfying. You're burning out. Or you discover that you've pursued a career you don't even enjoy.
Whatever it may be, you run out of a clear next answer.
You might know you need to go elsewhere — anywhere but where you are — but you have no idea how or where.
I've been there more than once.
I'm not someone who can stay for too long without growing and expanding. So I've found myself, more than once in life, facing the inevitable question:
Now what?
It's Healthy Not to Know
The common understanding seems to be that we should know where we're going and what we want.
But consider what informs this "knowing" most of the time.
What we "know" we want to do is often defined by the options we're aware exist for us — or believe exist for us.
We've all spent years being exposed to the ideas of our families, cultures and schools. And these days, we spend an inordinate amount of time on social media and elsewhere online.
In the normal course of events, we don't take much time to go within and consider what we truly want beyond these fragments of information we absorb.
We live within a certain bubble of information, with its own vibration and internal rules.
And within that bubble, some possibilities seem obvious, others seem unrealistic, and many never occur to us at all.
When I lived in New York, I decided I needed to do something new. I was starting to experience burnout and restlessness, but I had no idea what to do next.
Then one day, after weeks of contemplation, I met a woman in a German class I was taking with my husband.
I hated German, but I'd decided to be open and try something new.
That encounter reminded me of two passions I'd had as a teenager: law and psychology.
Somehow, I'd forgotten them entirely.
And with that, I found myself on the road to becoming a lawyer at a top international law firm.
That too came to an end after a few years.
But the more important point I'm trying to make is this: sometimes we forget. Sometimes we simply haven't had the chance to explore and discover.
We're so busy doing everything we do that going within, finding real space to exhale and just be, isn't something common for most of us.
And when we don't know what's next, we tend to treat that as a problem.
But what if not knowing is precisely what allows us to discover something we couldn't have imagined before?
Not Knowing Is the Beginning
It's scary not to know.
It can be outright petrifying.
You're supposed to make money, take care of yourself and maybe your family. You're supposed to have it figured out — you're an adult.
If this is you, you need to feel the fear and the tears behind the fear.
It's okay to feel it. It will be one of the most helpful things you can do.
Learning to not know what's next is an art. And we need it.
Because each one of us is a unique configuration, a unique soul on a journey — someone with Divine friends, connected to the Universe, and with a unique set of experiences, miracles and encounters.
If we let everyone around us stuff us with their ideas of what or where we should be, we may never get to open up to the possibilities that exist beyond what we already know.
And I'm not saying your journey will be a series of rainbows and glittery encounters.
My own journey wasn't very easy.
I left people I loved behind. I left a career I loved behind. I spent a lot of time on my own.
It was incredibly hard.
But all of it was my own, and it was true to me.
There's something important about learning to remain open when you don't have an answer.
It doesn't mean you stop living, making decisions or taking care of your responsibilities.
It doesn't mean sitting around waiting for the Universe to deliver a detailed plan.
You can do what's right in front of you while allowing yourself not to know what comes after.
You can follow an interest without knowing where it will lead.
You can meet people, explore, learn and experience life without needing every step to fit into a predetermined destination.
Sometimes, the next road becomes visible only because you've allowed yourself to wander a little.
Sincerely Seek and You Will Find
I used to hate not knowing what's next.
It made me cry, feel small and lost.
But then I learned to love it.
I realised that whatever the Divine had in store for me next was far more interesting and helpful than whatever society might deem appropriate.
I learned to allow myself to open up to possibilities — while doing what's right in front of me.
And that changed my relationship with uncertainty.
If you seek sincerely, I believe you will find your way towards an answer.
Say a prayer. Spend some time in quiet and solitude. Spend some time in nature.
Follow your interests.
Allow yourself to explore things that don't seem particularly useful or relevant to your current circumstances.
My inspiration to go to law school came through a surprising avenue — a German class I hadn't particularly wanted to take.
But I decided to be open and say yes.
And the Universe said yes right back to me.
We don't always know which encounters, interests or experiences will become meaningful later.
And perhaps we don't need to know.
Follow yourself. See where you go.
Not everything has to have an immediate benefit or purpose.