Tuesday 30 March 2021

Coping with uncertainty.

Hi there!

Trust you have had a good month! 

Lately, I have been ruminating on how wonderful it would be to enjoy the freedom of sitting in my favourite coffee shop and enjoying quality time with a good book or conversations with my favourite people. The lockdown and ensuing restrictions have been playing havoc with the mental state of many.  

Mental stimulation plays a vital role in keeping our mood / emotions stable. The pandemic has placed us in a state of uncertainty where routine things are now not clearly identified or defined. We do not know how much of our 'norm' will return and we are certainly unclear at this stage as to what the 'new norm' will look like. 

The reality about the nature of uncertainty is that, as a notion, it is fundamentally a mental state; a subjective, cognitive experience of human beings rather than a feature of the objective, material world. Associated with the experience of uncertainty is ignorance, that is, the lack of knowledge. Importantly, uncertainty is not equivalent to mere ignorance; rather, uncertainty is the conscious awareness, or subjective experience of ignorance. According to Lipshitz and Strauss (1997), there are three types of uncertainty: inadequate understanding, incomplete information, and undifferentiated alternatives

So how do we cope with uncertainty? 

Lipshitz and Strauss (1997) applied five strategies of coping: reducing uncertainty, assumption-based reasoning, weighing pros and cons of competing alternatives, suppressing uncertainty, and forestalling. Inadequate understanding was primarily managed by reduction of uncertainty, incomplete information was primarily managed by assumption-based reasoning, and conflict among alternatives was primarily managed by weighing pros and cons.

The last year, 2020, and most of 2021 so far, has left many people feeling discombobulated due to changed home and workplace routines, social and employment status and engagements, even our spiritual lives are affected. Unless we are aware of our ignorance, it is unlikely to influence our thoughts, feelings, or actions. That is, we can influence our behaviours if we are aware that we lack knowledge. We do not have to get in a rut. We do not have to give in to unwanted emotions. If there is something missing or potentially missing in our lives and if we want to change that, we can do something about it by applying the model above. 

Uncertainty can mean a platform for doing things you have never done before whilst stabilising your environment and mood at the sane time. If you require counselling support to deal with uncertainty, make an appointment via our website www.gcls.co.uk.

Until,

Jo-Ann