Summary
From childhood dreams of superpowers to reflections on aging and ambiguity, the writer considers how measured letting go might open a wider world.
At a glance
The writer proposes loosening control moderately, adjusting to changing circumstances, and continuing to seek solutions. Reported research suggests that older adults may tolerate ambiguity relatively well, with accumulated experience and secondary control offered as explanations. Accepting uncertainty may create room for possibility, hope, and creativity.
The writer recalls admiring superheroes as a child, wishing for their powers to understand everything and save the world. Adulthood brought the recognition that no such powers were available, but the effort to control life continued: pursuing the things they wanted to do and the people they wanted to love, exhausting every effort and waiting for an answer even when what they wanted remained out of reach.
Only later did living peacefully with uncertainty begin to seem possible. In a world that could change unpredictably, loosening their grip a little seemed wiser than holding on so tightly. Letting go, in that measured sense, might open a wider, more compelling world.
The uncertainties the writer considers range across ordinary life. Will a favorite homeroom teacher still teach the class next term? Will a familiar, manageable job change? Could a benign tumor found during a checkup worsen? Will two people who love each other stay together? When will the power go out, and when will it come back?
These questions, in the writer's view, usually arise from incomplete information. People generally prefer circumstances that are definite and stable. Yet unexpected developments remain unavoidable, and disliking uncertainty does nothing to make it disappear. How we understand and respond to it therefore matters.
One response is to try to eliminate it. People draw on whatever means they can to obtain the latest information, while technological advances allow increasingly precise predictions of how complex phenomena will unfold. Even these growing capabilities, however, cannot make life easy to control.
For the writer, the COVID-19 pandemic brought that limit into sharper focus: circumstances could change faster than preparations that had seemed to cover everything. Accurate, comprehensive information was often out of reach, and few could vouch for the information arriving through different channels. Trying harder to take control could bring greater anxiety, until everything seemed to carry a question mark.
Other people manage to live alongside uncertainty and remain steady amid change. As the writer observes, they do not necessarily seek out unpredictable situations; they can simply meet ambiguity calmly when it arises. Research summarized in the account suggests that this tolerance may be positively associated with age, with older adults tending to handle ambiguous situations relatively well.
The writer cites research from 1991 by Bronston T. Mayes, an American specialist in organizational behavior and human resource management, and his colleagues. They reportedly found that employees around sixty did not fare particularly badly when faced with role ambiguity at work: insufficient information about the nature of their role, the duties they were expected to fulfill, or the consequences of their behavior.
In this account of the findings, role ambiguity was associated with higher life satisfaction and fewer symptoms of poor physical health, with these relationships more pronounced among older employees. The writer describes these employees as capable of managing ambiguous, complex work and suggests that they even seemed interested in ambiguous situations.
A separate finding attributed to Canadian psychology researcher Basevitz and colleagues concerned adults over sixty-five, who reportedly showed greater tolerance of uncertainty than adults aged nineteen to thirty-seven. From these reports, the writer draws a broader picture of older adults as generally more accepting of open-ended situations and less insistent on completely definite instructions or answers. The pattern remains tentative and comparative, rather than a claim that aging causes greater tolerance or that every older adult responds this way.
Why might older adults be less averse to uncertainty? The writer offers two explanations. The first centers on crystallized intelligence—the knowledge and abilities built through accumulated experience, which can remain relatively strong in later life. Experience may help compensate for incomplete information about their surroundings, giving older adults confidence to use what they already know when analyzing complex situations and relationships.
The second explanation concerns secondary control, which the writer describes as stronger among older adults. The dual-process theory of control distinguishes two ways of exercising control: primary control means changing the environment to meet one's needs; secondary control means changing oneself to accommodate the environment.
The writer connects primary control with technological progress and modernization, reflecting the longstanding human effort to use ingenuity to bring external conditions under our direction. Self-adjustment can also be a form of wisdom. When unexpected problems keep arising, first finding a way to live peacefully with them may be worthwhile. Older adults, in the writer's view, are particularly accomplished at this kind of adjustment.
The research summary presented in the account reports that most studies find little change in adults' primary control as they age, while secondary control gradually increases. The writer explains this adaptation partly in terms of recognizing that aging brings declines in various capacities. Continually resisting external circumstances may no longer seem worth the effort. Accommodating developments can go hand in hand with looking for solutions, while regulating emotions and changing ways of thinking can help people adjust to complex situations.
Returning to the workplace, Mayes, as the writer recounts his argument, suggests that older employees need not see role ambiguity as a problem. They may instead see room for autonomy and opportunity in it.
The writer extends this possibility beyond work: accepting uncertainty and making use of it, with a relaxed, composed, open attitude, may reveal fresh possibilities and hope, and stimulate greater creativity.
There is still value, in this outlook, in the struggles of youth. Never having worried about losing control, or felt the ambition to overcome life's unpredictability, could itself be a loss. Yet experience can teach us that some problems have no standard answer. Relentlessly trying to eliminate uncertainty is not the only way to feel secure.
The writer's invitation is to embrace uncertainty, experience it, and learn to live alongside it. Doing so may bring a more varied and rewarding world within reach.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between primary and secondary control?
The dual-process theory of control distinguishes two ways of exercising control: primary control means changing the environment to meet one's needs; secondary control means changing oneself to accommodate the environment.
Does accepting uncertainty mean giving up on solutions?
In the writer's account, accommodating developments can go hand in hand with looking for solutions. The invitation is to loosen control moderately while adapting to circumstances.
Do older adults always tolerate uncertainty better?
Research summarized in the account suggests a tentative association between age and tolerance of uncertainty. The reported comparisons do not establish that aging causes greater tolerance or that every older adult responds this way.
