I don't know – yet.

There is pain caused by what has happened – or what didn't happen. And then there is another form of strain that we rarely talk about, even though most of us know it: not knowing what is going to happen. This article is about what uncertainty does to thought, emotion, and will – and ultimately to the body. It is about the particular uncertainty that arises when a loss cannot be clearly seen: the sudden breakup no one can explain, and the partner who is dying without anyone knowing when. And it is about how we can remain standing in the unresolved without abandoning ourselves. It is written both for you who are in the middle of a time of waiting, and for you who work with people who are.

From the outside, uncertainty can look like a void. After all, nothing has happened yet. But inside a person, a great deal can happen. Because when we don't know what is coming, the organism tries to prepare for what might come. And here lies part of uncertainty's particular force: We can relate to a single reality, even when it is painful. It is far more difficult to relate to ten possible realities all at once.

The article falls into two parts. The first part describes what uncertainty does to us and why. The second part is about stamina – about what can be done while the answer has not yet arrived. Along the way, we follow four people: a man in remand custody, a woman whose partner left her without explanation, a woman waiting for test results, and a man whose wife is dying – without anyone being able to say when. Four very different situations. But the same underlying mechanism.

PART I · WHAT UNCERTAINTY DOES TO US

Four people, one underlying mechanism

Imagine a person sitting in remand custody. He doesn't know when the case will come to court. He doesn't know what the outcome will be. Maybe he hopes for release. Maybe he fears several years in prison. One day he thinks: It will be okay. The next: My life is ruined. The third: Maybe I'm coming home. The fourth: What if I don't? The event has not yet taken place. Still, the body lives through it again and again.

A woman came home one Tuesday and found a note on the kitchen table. After eleven years. No argument, no prior conversation, no explanation – just two lines saying he "couldn't do it anymore" and that he "needed space". He doesn't answer messages. His family doesn't know what to say. There isn't someone else – she thinks. The breakup has happened. And yet, there is nothing she can relate to. What happened? When did it start? Was it me? Is he coming back? Should I wait? Should I fight? Should I grieve – for a person who is still alive and lives twenty minutes away?

Another woman has had a biopsy taken. The doctor said it was "probably nothing serious". The results will arrive in ten days. The first couple of days she doesn't think much about it. Then the waiting begins to take up space. She checks her inbox more often. She googles symptoms she hadn't noticed before. She goes to sleep and suddenly feels her own body in a new way – is that a sensation in her side, or is it just her attention that has been heightened? She doesn't know. No one can tell her. Not until day ten.

And a man sits beside his wife, who is terminally ill. The doctors said "maybe six months" – ten months ago. Some weeks she is almost herself. Other weeks she sleeps most of the day. He knows how it ends. He just doesn't know when, and he doesn't know who she will be next week. He has already said goodbye several times – and feels ashamed of it, because she is alive, after all. He doesn't dare plan anything. Nor does he dare not to. Every morning he wakes up not knowing if it is an ordinary day or the last.

Four situations. None of them has anything resolved to relate to. And for that very reason, all four are demanding to bear. When reality becomes unclear, humans begin to produce possible realities. And the more important what we risk losing is to us, the stronger this process becomes.

Uncertainty is not the same as anxiety

Uncertainty and anxiety are often confused, but they are not the same. Uncertainty is fundamentally a condition of life: I do not know what is going to happen. Anxiety is one of the organism's possible reactions to this condition.

The distinction is important, because uncertainty exists everywhere. We do not know for certain whether our relationship will last the rest of our lives. We do not know if we will recover our health. We do not know how our children will fare. We do not even know for certain what tomorrow will look like. Most of the time, we can live with this fundamental indeterminacy. But some forms of uncertainty become so significant, long-lasting, or threatening that the organism begins to react to them as danger.

Research uses the concept intolerance of uncertainty to describe the tendency to experience the unknown itself as threatening, even when the probability of a concrete threat is not high. It is a well-documented concept in clinical psychology research on anxiety and worry, and today it emerges as a common mechanism across many different forms of psychological strain (Carleton, 2016). Research reviews point to altered responses in the brain areas and systems involved in threat assessment, safety learning, error detection, and emotion regulation (Tanovic, Gee & Joormann, 2018).

This tells us something important: Humans do not only react to danger. We also react to the possibility of danger.

Thought, emotion, and will under pressure

At HjerteDialog, we work with a tripartite division of inner life that goes far back in human self-understanding: thought, emotion, and will. Thought interprets the world. Emotion responds to what the world means to me. Will moves me out into the world. The order is not accidental: It usually begins with an interpretation, the interpretation awakens an emotion, and the emotion seeks an action. And when these three links cannot find rest, it is the body that ultimately bears the strain.

When a person is in balance, these three links work together. Under prolonged uncertainty, each of them begins to orbit the same unanswered question – and they begin to disturb one another. It is worth looking at them one by one, because each calls for a different kind of help.

Thought: it wants to predict – and cannot bring closure

A living human being cannot wait passively for the world to happen. Thought is constantly working with probabilities: What does this facial expression mean? What happens if I say this? Is the situation safe? Should I approach or withdraw? Our ability to predict is a tremendous strength. But when crucial information is missing, a problem arises: The system cannot complete the calculation. Therefore, it continues. Maybe… What if… On the other hand… But if… I should just check…

A comprehensive neurobiological review has even proposed uncertainty as a central element in stress: The organism must expend resources on continuously reducing the difference between the expected and the unknown, and the longer this lack of resolution lasts, the greater the strain becomes (Peters, McEwen & Friston, 2017).

Prolonged uncertainty therefore gradually changes the way we think. Thinking becomes more circular, threat-oriented, black-and-white, controlling, repetitive, and catastrophic. We believe we are thinking to solve the problem. But at some point, thinking itself has become part of the problem. There is a difference between reflection and rumination. Reflection moves. Rumination circles. Reflection can end in: "I don't know what is going to happen. But this is what I can do." Rumination returns to: "But what if…?" again and again. Reflection separates what I know from what I imagine. Rumination blends the two together until the imagination feels like knowledge.

The woman with the note on the kitchen table knows this better than anyone. Her thought has one job: to find the explanation. It revisits the last few months, the last few years, every sentence, every silence. But the explanation isn't in her head – it lies with a person who isn't answering. So thought continues. Not because she is weak, but because thought cannot close a story that has not been given an ending.

Emotion: between hope and fear

What thought interprets, emotion responds to. And it is in the emotional life that uncertainty is felt most directly – as the swinging pendulum between hope and fear that the man in remand custody knows from his four days. Emotion is not the enemy here. It is a compass: Fear tells us that something important is at stake. Hope tells us what we long for. Anticipatory grief tells us what we care about. The problem is not that we feel. The problem arises when emotion loses its connection to reality and begins to respond to imaginings as if they were facts.

Under prolonged uncertainty, something also often happens that is worth knowing from emotion-focused work: The primary emotion – the fear of losing – becomes covered by secondary emotions that are easier to bear or express (Greenberg, 2002). Fear becomes irritation. Grief becomes anger at the system, at the doctors, at him who left. Helplessness becomes shame over "not being able to pull oneself together". When we work with a person in uncertainty, one of the first steps is to find our way back to the primary emotion. It is almost always simpler – and truer – than the one lying on top.

The man by his wife's bed experiences something that is even harder: His emotions contradict each other. He grieves while she is alive. He hopes while he knows. He longs for it to be over – and hates himself for that longing. The emotional life cannot choose because reality has not chosen. We will return to this.

Will: when bound to the future

Emotion seeks an action – and here, uncertainty hits the realm of the will. Because action usually requires a direction. If all possibilities still remain open, a person begins to wait. I'll start when I know… I'll decide when… I'll start living again when… I'll take a stance when he has explained himself… I'll plan when the doctors say something more precise…

Thus, months – sometimes years – can be put in parentheses. This is one of uncertainty's most overlooked consequences: A person stops living in the present because they are waiting for permission from the future. The will becomes bound to something it cannot control.

The woman who was left can neither grieve nor fight – for she does not know which of the two is right. The man by the hospital bed can neither plan nor abstain from doing so. This is the particular suffering of the will under uncertainty: It is not paralyzed because it lacks power. It is paralyzed because it lacks direction.

And the body carries it

When thought cannot reach closure, feeling cannot choose, and the will cannot act, it is the body that ultimately carries the burden. It is therefore misleading to tell someone in serious uncertainty: "Just stop thinking about it." Thinking is only one of the components. We live through our entire nervous system, and psychological strain is therefore never merely mental. It is felt as unrest in the stomach, tightness in the chest, tension, fatigue, or a sense that the whole organism is on high alert.

If the uncertainty is perceived as threatening, the body mobilizes. Attention sharpens. Muscles tense. Sleep becomes lighter. Small signals gain greater significance. For short periods, this is adaptive – it is how we are built. The problem arises when the question "what is happening?" cannot be answered. Then the state of alarm finds no natural endpoint. In daily life, we experience this as racing thoughts, restlessness, sleep problems, tension, irritability, difficulty concentrating, uneasiness, a need for control – or a strange inability to be fully present.

The body remembers more than the situation

Not everyone reacts equally strongly to uncertainty – and it is rarely a matter of how "strong" or "weak" one is. The way the nervous system meets uncertainty is shaped by what it has encountered before.

The polyvagal theory describes how our physiological state continuously – and mostly outside conscious control – shifts between states of safety, mobilization, and shutdown, depending on what the nervous system assesses as safe or dangerous (Porges, 2011). This unconscious assessment – neuroception – is what we work with at HjerteDialog in our nervous system regulation model: Before thought has even interpreted the situation, the body has already decided whether we are safe. Thought, feeling, and will therefore never operate on neutral ground.

In people who have previously experienced stressful or traumatic events, this evaluation system itself may have become more sensitive. Research indicates that early stress affects the brain networks responsible for threat assessment and emotional regulation, making later uncertainty more likely to trigger a full alarm reaction – even in situations that are objectively not dangerous (Teicher & Samson, 2016).

This is not a weakness. It is the logical consequence of a nervous system that once had to learn to survive something real. But it also means that two people can be in the exact same uncertain situation and experience vastly different levels of stress. This is worth knowing, both as the person experiencing it and as the one standing alongside, wondering why the other person is reacting "so strongly" to "just" uncertainty.

Three dimensions – one question

We can therefore view prolonged uncertainty as a strain on three human dimensions, each asking its own question – and on the body in which the three reside:

• Thought: What is happening? What is going to happen?
• Feeling: What does it mean for me – what am I about to lose?
• Will: What should I do?
• Body: Am I safe?

When uncertainty becomes intense, all three elements revolve around the same unanswered question. Thought seeks answers. Feeling fluctuates. The will waits. And the body keeps guard. It is this tripartite structure that the rest of the article – and the compass at the end – is built upon. For help, too, must follow three paths – and reach the body in the end.

When time loses its structure

Prolonged uncertainty also affects our experience of time. Normally, we live with an implicit timeline: past → present → future. I roughly know where I come from. I roughly know where I stand. And I have ideas about where I am going. In times of serious uncertainty, the future becomes foggy. And when the future becomes foggy, the present loses direction.

This is not only seen in cases of deprivation of liberty. It can happen during a serious medical investigation while waiting for test results, during a divorce, amidst a notice of redundancy, during an asylum process, with debt, during fertility treatment, when a child is critically ill, when a partner is dying, or when a partner says: "I don't know if I want us anymore."

The woman waiting for her test results knows this fog. Day one is different from day five. Day five is different from day nine. She has not changed. The situation has not changed. But her relationship with time has changed – ten days are no longer just ten days. They are ten attempts to live in two realities at once. And for the man by the hospital bed, it is not ten days. It is ten months – and no one knows if it will be ten more.

The person finds themselves in a space in-between. The old may no longer apply. The new does not yet exist. Anthropology has a name for this: the liminal – the threshold state between what one was and what one is becoming (van Gennep, 1909/1960; Turner, 1969). Transition research calls it the neutral zone, describing it as the phase in any life transition that is hardest to endure, precisely because it is neither an end nor a beginning (Bridges, 2004). At HjerteDialog, we call it the threshold space. It is not the past, and it is not the future. It is the place where a person actually has to live while the answer has not yet arrived.

When the loss is hard to see – ambiguous loss and complicated grief

There is a form of uncertainty that is particularly difficult because it is not just about what is going to happen – but about what has already happened. Family therapist and researcher Pauline Boss calls it ambiguous loss: a loss that cannot be confirmed, and therefore cannot be fully grieved (Boss, 1999).

Boss describes two basic types. In the first, the person is physically absent but psychologically present: He is gone – but he is alive, he exists, he could return, and no goodbye has been said. Classic examples include missing persons and adopted-away children, but the most common form in therapeutic practice is the sudden, unexplained rupture: the partner who disappears without explanation, the adult son who cuts off contact, the friend who simply stops responding. In the second type, the person is physically present but psychologically absent – or disappearing: dementia, brain injury, severe mental illness. And the slow farewell to a dying partner, where no one can say how much time is left.

The woman with the note and the man by the hospital bed thus face two different versions of the same phenomenon. And what makes this phenomenon so burdensome is that it freezes all three dimensions at once:

Thought cannot bring closure to the story. It has no explanation and no ending to close around. There is no death to relate to, no agreement that "it's over", no moment when the doctor says "now". So thought remains in its investigation – why, when, what if – without being able to move on.

Feeling can neither grieve nor hope. Grief requires that something has been lost; hope requires that something can be gained. With ambiguous loss, both may be true, leaving the emotional life trapped in a dual movement that finds no rest. The woman feels guilty when she grieves ("after all, he is alive, and maybe he will return") and naive when she hopes ("after all, he has left me"). The man feels treacherous when he grieves in advance, and irresponsible when he forgets to do so.

The will can neither leave nor stay. Should she pack his belongings or leave them? Should she agree to meet others – or wait? Should he plan the summer? Cancel it? Accept the job starting in the autumn? Every action presupposes a reality that has not been settled, and therefore no action is taken.

This is why Boss calls ambiguous loss "the most stressful loss" – not because it is greater than other losses, but because it has no end (Boss, 2006). The rituals that normally help people through grief – the funeral, the conversation, having others acknowledge the loss – are unavailable. Those around do not know whether to offer condolences or encouragement. And the affected person does not know either.

Anticipatory grief – and grief that cannot begin

Modern grief research distinguishes between ordinary grief, which hurts and moves, and prolonged or complicated grief, which becomes stuck – where the yearning, rumination, and emotional pain do not subside over time, but remain debilitating months and years after the loss (Shear, 2015). Known risk factors include that the loss occurred suddenly, remained unexplained, and could not be acknowledged and processed together with others. Ambiguous loss contains all three.

In cases of a partner's long-term illness, research reveals something important for both the affected individual and the professional to know: Grief does not begin at the moment of death. It begins long before – and the strain of grieving someone who is still alive is linked to how grief unfolds afterward. A Danish research review found that a high level of pre-loss grief was associated with more severe post-loss grief – pointing to the need for intervention during the phase of uncertainty, not only after the funeral (Nielsen, Neergaard, Jensen, Bro & Guldin, 2016).

It changes something about how we view the man at the bedside. He is not "preparing for a grief." He is grieving. Now. And he must be allowed to be so while his wife is still alive—without it making him a bad husband.

What Boss teaches us about living with the unresolved

Boss's most important contribution is not a technique for resolving ambiguous loss. It is the realization that it cannot be resolved—and that the goal must therefore be different: to be able to live with ambiguity without being broken by it. She describes several pathways (Boss, 2006), and they align almost precisely with the article's three steps:

For thought: Replacing either-or with both-and. Not "is he gone, or is he coming back?"—but: "He is both gone and present in my life." Not "is she alive, or is she dying?"—but: "She is both here and slipping away." This is not a mind game. It is the only sentence that is true, and the mind can only find rest in a sentence that is true.

For emotion: Normalizing ambivalence. Grieving and hoping at the same time is not a sign of confusion—it is the correct emotional response to an ambiguous reality. The guilt over these conflicting feelings is often heavier than the feelings themselves.

For the will: Letting go of mastery—giving up the demand to get the situation resolved—and instead finding what can still be decided. Which of his belongings stay, and which are packed away? What do we plan for next week—not for the summer? And revising the attachment without severing it: She can bring him along in her life as a person who was, without requiring him to be someone who will return.

And for the body, which carries it all: giving it small, predictable anchors in a reality that has none.

Uncertainty in relationships

Ambiguous loss is the extreme. But some of the most intense everyday uncertainty arises within these same intimate relationships—long before anything has broken. This makes sense: Something fundamental is at stake here—the connection to another human being.

Attachment research shows that stress activates different strategies depending on our attachment patterns (Simpson & Rholes, 2017). Anxiously attached individuals become more hyperaware of signs of distance and rejection, while avoidant attachment leads to other regulatory strategies—including withdrawal and downplaying the need for closeness. Recent research further demonstrates that insecure attachment patterns make partners more vulnerable to stress during periods of strain—but also that a secure and supportive partner can significantly "buffer" this vulnerability (Overall, Pietromonaco & Simpson, 2022).

Uncertainty therefore often creates a paradoxical dynamic: One partner becomes anxious and seeks more contact. "Are we okay?" The other feels the pressure and withdraws. The first registers the withdrawal. The uncertainty grows. The question is asked again. The other withdraws even further. Now a self-reinforcing loop has taken hold: uncertainty → need for contact → perceived pressure → distance → greater uncertainty. And in its ultimate outcome, that cycle ends with a note left on a kitchen table.

Relational uncertainty does not exist only "in your head." In an experimental study, uncertainty about a partner was associated with greater cortisol reactivity when participants had to process hurtful messages from their partner—and with slower physiological recovery, even after receiving a supportive message (Priem & Solomon, 2011). The body participates in the relationship.

When love becomes investigative work

A person who becomes sufficiently insecure begins to investigate their own relationship. The phone. The look. The calendar. Online status. Choice of words. Sexual interest. How quickly the partner responds. Who was at the party. And after a breakup, the investigation continues—now into the past: When did it begin? What did I miss? What did he say in March?

The problem is that this kind of control provides short-term relief and long-term heightened uncertainty. Because if I teach my nervous system that "I can only be calm once I have checked," the next impulse becomes: "Check again." The same applies to repeated questions: "Do you love me?" The partner replies: "Yes." Calm descends. Twenty minutes later: "But do you really mean it?" This is not necessarily a lack of love. It is a nervous system trying to create security.

Safety and certainty are not the same

Here comes a crucial nuance. A living relationship can never provide complete certainty. The other person is a free human being. Love therefore always entails a degree of risk. I can love you—but I cannot own you. I can choose you—but I cannot guarantee the future. I can promise fidelity—but you can never prove that I will be here in twenty years.

If love demands absolute certainty, we risk slowly suffocating the very thing we are trying to protect. A mature relationship is not a relationship without uncertainty. It is a relationship where we can tolerate a certain amount of uncertainty without losing connection to ourselves or each other. Healthy tension, a boundary, or an unresolved evening is not the same as a relational break—and the ability to tell the difference is part of what distinguishes safety from certainty.

When uncertainty is numbed – uncertainty and addiction

There is one reaction to uncertainty that deserves its own section because it is so widespread and so rarely called by its true name: We numb it.

At HjerteDialog, we work from the understanding that substance abuse and addiction always begin as an attempted solution. The drug, the alcohol, the gambling, the food, the work, the screen, the other person—they do something for us before they do something to us. And one of the things they do best is remove uncertainty. Not in reality—but in the nervous system. A drink provides what waiting cannot: a moment of certainty. In that sense, craving is often a longing for predictability. I don't know what the verdict will be—but I know exactly what those three beers will do. I don't know how long she has left—but I know I can sleep if I take two.

It is no coincidence that waiting periods are classic relapse windows. Stress research has long shown that prolonged, uncontrollable stress is one of the strongest drivers behind both the development of addiction and relapse—and uncertainty is precisely uncontrollable stress in its purest form (Sinha, 2008). The period leading up to a trial, the weeks before test results, the months spent by a sickbed, the time following a breakup without explanation—that is when many lose their footing, not when the answer arrives.

Furthermore, relapse rarely begins with the act itself. It begins emotionally (unrest, isolation, poor sleep, neglecting self-care), continues mentally (the mind begins to negotiate: "just this once," "I've earned it," "no one will notice"), and only ends physically at the very last step (Melemis, 2015). These three stages are the same ones this article is built upon—and anyone who recognizes their own early signs in thought and emotion can intervene long before the will is compromised and the body gets the final say.

The same pattern exists in relational addiction. Here, the "drug" is not a substance, but the other person—and monitoring the partner, checking the phone, the third "do you love me?" is the relational equivalent of the glass meant to bring calm. It works for twenty minutes. And then checking is required again.

Therefore, one of the most important questions you can ask someone living in uncertainty—and yourself—is: What do I do to avoid feeling that I do not know?

The unbearable uncertainty: being in pre-trial detention

At the other extreme are situations where uncertainty is not voluntary and cannot be regulated through ordinary clarification. Pre-trial detention is a striking example. Here, a person is deprived of control over the most fundamental circumstances: When is the next court hearing? How long will I be here? What will the sentence be? What happens to my family? My job? My housing? My finances?

Research among young people in pre-trial detention in Ireland describes uncertainty as a central strain that impairs both the ability to cope with the loss of liberty itself and to move forward later (Freeman & Seymour, 2010). A new pilot study—a randomized trial of a program called Adapt – Life on Remand—confirms that this specific phase is characterized by uncertainty and vulnerability, targeting its interventions at emotional and behavioral regulation, problem solving, and suicide prevention for people in custody (Andrade et al., 2025). The fact that research is being conducted on how to help people navigate uncertainty itself—not just the punishment, should it come—says something about how seriously this phenomenon is taken today.

Here, the difference between danger and uncertainty becomes particularly clear. If the person knew the sentence—even a severe one—a new psychological process could begin: This is reality. What do I do now? During pre-trial detention, the person is trapped in a perpetual: What if?

Control is the temptation of uncertainty

When we cannot create certainty, we attempt to create control. We investigate. Plan. Ask. Double-check. Analyse. Predict. Secure. Avoid. Control is not wrong in itself – a degree of control is necessary for a responsible life. The problem arises when we try to control the uncontrollable.

Therefore, there are two questions almost always worth asking, regardless of the uncertainty you face: Can I do something about this – or can I only do something with it, while it is as it is?

The man in custody can prepare thoroughly for the trial together with his defence attorney. He cannot prepare for the verdict, because no one knows it yet. The woman waiting for her test results can go to the doctor, follow up, accept support. She cannot speed up the cells in the laboratory. The woman who was left can write the letter she needs to write – and decide for herself whether to send it. She cannot force an explanation from a person who does not want to give one. The man at the bedside can make this week good. He cannot make it the last or the second to last.

Here, one of life's great dividing lines emerges: What is my responsibility – and what is not in my power?

PART II · FROM UNCERTAINTY TO RESILIENCE

The Other Side of Uncertainty

Until now, it might sound as if uncertainty is purely negative. It is not. For if everything were certain, nothing new could arise. We do not know the outcome of the conversation we have not yet had. We do not know the person we have not yet met. We do not know the work we have not yet created. We do not know the version of ourselves that might stand on the other side of a life crisis.

This is not merely a comforting thought – it has been researched. As early as 1962, personality psychology described how people are differently equipped to bear ambiguity: Some experience the unknown as threatening, others as interesting, and this ability – tolerance for ambiguity – is linked to how we generally handle new and complex situations (Budner, 1962). Later, counselling and career research developed the concept of positive uncertainty: the idea that one can consciously learn to make good decisions and move forward, even without – and never having – full information (Gelatt, 1989). In other words, speaking about the other side of uncertainty is not naive. It is a competency that can be trained.

The problem is that the body cannot always tell the difference. The unknown can contain danger. But it can just as well contain possibility, growth, and that which has not yet come to be – and part of the therapeutic work consists of giving the body the opportunity to discover this.

The Threshold Space Calls for Holding Capacity

There are periods in life where our task is not to solve the situation. We simply cannot do so yet. Something is ending. Something else has not yet begun. Here, the crucial human competency is not control. It becomes holding capacity.

Can I be here without immediately fleeing? Can I feel my unrest without letting it dictate all my actions? Can I leave the question open? Can I continue to eat? Sleep? Move? Meet people? Tend to my obligations? Feel the sun? Laugh? Be loving? While I still do not know?

This is something different from passivity. It often requires significant inner activity.

Standing Firm in the Unresolved

At HjerteDialog, we work with the phrase the courage to remain standing in the unresolved. This theme is part of the Masterclass course A Life in Freedom.

Remaining standing does not mean accepting everything. Not staying in a harmful relationship. Not failing to act. Not romanticising suffering. And not waiting passively for other people's decisions.

It means: that I do not abandon myself simply because I do not yet know the outcome. I remain in contact with reality. I remain in contact with my body. I remain in contact with other people. I remain in contact with my values. And I do what can actually be done.

The following sections follow the tripartite division from part one: thought, feeling, will – and finally the body. The order reflects how uncertainty works its way into us. But an honest caveat belongs here: Once the body is on full high alert, neither thought, feeling, nor will can function properly, and then one must begin by bringing calm to the body – the exercise at the end of this section is designed for precisely that. Afterwards, the three aspects can receive their help.

Thought Must Have a Frame

Thought cannot be stopped – but it can be given a frame. The most important tool is the separation between what I know and what I imagine. Try quite specifically to write it down in two columns. Under "know", there is often surprisingly little: The test has been taken. The result comes Thursday. The doctor said "probably not serious". Or: He has moved out. He does not reply. He has not said it is forever. Under "imagine", everything else is listed.

With ambiguous loss, two more tools apply: the sentence that is true. Thought cannot find rest in "he is coming back" or "he is never coming back", because neither has been confirmed. It can find rest in: He is gone, and I do not know why. Both are true, and I can live with both of them today. This is the both-and thinking from Boss. It sounds simple. It is not – but it is the only place thought can land without lying.

The second tool is shrinking the time horizon. When the future becomes too vast, we must think in shorter spans:

• Not: "What will the rest of my life be like?" – but: "What does this day call for?"
• Not: "Is he ever coming back?" – but: "What do I need this week – whether he does or not?"
• Not: "How much time do we have left?" – but: "What makes this day good for both of us?"
• Not: "How will I survive perhaps three years in prison?" – but: "How do I take care of myself today?"
• Not: "What if the examination shows cancer?" – but: "What do I actually know today?"

The third tool is giving worry a scheduled time. Not forbidding it, but agreeing with yourself: At 5 p.m., I will sit with it for twenty minutes. Until then, it must wait. Thought protests at first. But it learns – and it teaches the nervous system that uncertainty does not have to fill the entire day.

Feeling Must Have a Place to Be

Feeling cannot be reasoned away, and it cannot be solved. It can only be felt and shared. The first step is therefore to put words to it – precisely. Not "I'm feeling bad", but: I am afraid of losing her. I am afraid it is cancer. I am afraid I will never find out why. I am afraid of coming out and not having a life to return to.

Put words to the catastrophe instead of letting it live as diffuse anxiety. A named fear is smaller than an unnamed one. And trace back behind the secondary emotions: Is the irritation actually fear? Is the anger at the person who left actually grief? The primary emotion is always easier to be in contact with – and it usually points directly to what we care about.

With ambiguous loss, there is another step: allowing opposing feelings to exist at the same time. The woman must be allowed to grieve for him and hope for him. The man must be allowed to grieve for his wife while holding her hand, and be allowed to laugh with her that same afternoon. Ambivalence is not a mistake. It is the correct response to a reality that has not settled. Much of the therapeutic work here consists of removing guilt from ambivalence – for it is the guilt, not the grief, that makes it unbearable.

And then feeling must have another human being to be with. We will return to this.

Loosening the Will: From Outcome Control to the Next Step

The will is bound when it waits for a result. It is released when it is given an action that is possible now.

At HjerteDialog, we work with a principle that recurs throughout all our clinical work: We cannot always find the perfect solution or know the outcome – but we can always find the next responsible action. Not the final one. Not the one that solves everything. The next one.

For the man in custody, it might be writing a letter home. For the woman waiting, it might be agreeing with a friend who she will call on Thursday – regardless of the answer. For the woman who was left, it might be packing one box – not all of them – and putting it in the basement; not throwing it away, not leaving it out. For the man at the sickbed, it might be planning next weekend as if there will be one – because there likely will be – and agreeing with himself that plans may be cancelled without guilt.

In ambiguous loss, the work of the will also involves giving up one specific action: the demand to get the situation resolved. Boss calls this tempering mastery – to stop using one's energy trying to force a resolution that does not exist, and instead using it on what can still be decided. It is not giving up. It is directing the will to where it can actually work.

Here, the will is released. For I do not need to know the whole road to take the next step. And every step taken without a guarantee teaches the nervous system something no insurance can teach it: that I can act while I do not know.

And the body – where the burden lands

When thought, feeling, and will have circulated long enough, it is the body that pays the price: sleep, appetite, tension, the constant light restlessness. Therefore, working with uncertainty must also be somatic – not instead of the three elements, but as their foundation. Sleep. Food. Movement. Rhythm. Breathing. Nature. Touch, when safe. Human contact. Breaks from information-seeking. Small predictable rituals.

That sounds banal. It isn't. When the outer world is unpredictable, small areas of predictability help the organism regain its footing. What the nervous system cannot get from the future, it can to some extent get from the next hour. And for someone living with ambiguous loss, this is often the only thing that can be made predictable at all: the morning coffee, the walk, bedtime – the same every day, regardless of what else the day brings.

Exercise: Three anchors

A simple exercise we use at HjerteDialog when uncertainty has taken over and the body is on high alert. It takes three minutes and can be done anywhere – in a cell, a waiting room, at a sickbed, or in a bed where you cannot sleep.

• The ground beneath you. Feel what you are sitting or standing on. Your feet against the floor, your back against the chair. Let your weight drop down. Say to yourself inside: Right now, I am being held.
• The exhalation. Breathe in as you normally do, and make the exhalation a little longer than the inhalation. Five or six times. The long exhalation is the body's own signal to the nervous system that there is no danger right now.
• The room. Let your gaze wander slowly around the room. Find three things you can see, two sounds you can hear, one thing you can touch. The nervous system re-orients itself – and usually discovers that the room is safe, even if the future is not.

End with the question: What does my body actually know right now? Not what thought fears – what the body knows. Usually, the answer is simpler than expected: I am sitting here. I am breathing. There is no danger in this room. Only when the body has received that answer can thought, feeling, and will do their work once again.

We don't only regulate ourselves

One of the most important perspectives is relational. Humans do not learn regulation alone first. We first learn to be regulated together with others. A face. A voice. A gaze. A hand. A person who stays.

Therefore, the most important support for someone experiencing uncertainty can be surprisingly simple: another human being who can bear not knowing together with us. Not immediately offering solutions. Not saying: "Everything will be okay." Because we don't know that. Not saying: "He wasn't good enough for you anyway" or "She is at peace now" – because those are answers to questions the affected person didn't ask. But perhaps saying: "I don't know how it will end either. But you don't have to stand alone with it."

That is an entirely different form of security. It does not promise a specific outcome. It offers connection amidst the unknown. In ambiguous loss, it is often the only recognition the loss receives – as there is no funeral, no condolence, no ritual. A person saying, "I can see that you have lost something, even if no one else can see it," gives ambiguous loss the reality it lacks.

And for someone working professionally with people experiencing uncertainty, this is perhaps the most important competency of all: to be able to remain standing in the client's unresolved state without filling it with one's own solutions, anxiety, or false comfort.

HjerteDialog's uncertainty compass

When life becomes unresolved, the following questions can serve as a compass. They follow the article's three-part structure – and they can be used alone, in a conversation, or as a structure for a therapeutic process.

The last question is perhaps the most important. Because if we can only live when life is secure, our freedom becomes very small.

Freedom is not knowing the future

We spend enormous energy trying to make life secure. That is understandable. But the deepest form of security is perhaps not found in knowing what is going to happen. It is found in a growing experience of:

I can meet whatever comes. I can ask for help. I can feel myself. I can think clearly again when my thoughts run away. I can act when action is possible. I can wait when I must wait. I can grieve if something is lost – even before it is lost. I can rejoice if something new arises. I can stay connected.

That is something different from security. That is inner resilience.

When uncertainty becomes an invitation

Perhaps, therefore, there is a deeper question hidden within our uncertainty. Not only: How do I make the uncertainty disappear? But: Who do I become while I do not know?

Do I become controlling? Do I withdraw? Do I reach for quick answers? Do I numb myself? Do I let others make my choices? Or can I slowly develop a different movement: presence, acceptance, bodily calm, connection, action, trust?

Uncertainty is not necessarily our enemy. But it often reveals where we still lack footing. And perhaps a significant part of human maturity lies right here: being able to stand with both feet in reality while the future is still open.

Being able to say: I don't know. Without immediately adding a catastrophe.

Being able to be in love without owning it.

Being able to be in the waiting without putting your entire life on pause.

Being able to grieve over something that is not finished – and hope for it at the same time.

Being able to feel the fear without giving it full control.

Being able to act without a guarantee.

Being able to hope without certainty.

And being able to remain standing long enough for something new to perhaps begin.

Four outcomes

The man received his sentence. Three years. It wasn't what he had hoped for. But it was something he could relate to – and that day, for the first time in eight months, he began counting forward instead of counting possibilities.

The woman with the note never got her explanation. He didn't answer. A year later, she heard through others that he had moved to another city. There was no someone else. Nor was there any reason she was ever told. What changed was not his silence – it was that she stopped letting the silence determine whether she was allowed to live. She still grieves occasionally. And she has found a life that doesn't wait.

The woman received her test results. It was benign. She was surprised that the relief didn't come right away – her body needed a few days to believe it.

The man's wife died in March. Fourteen months after the doctors had said "maybe half a year". The last weeks were hard. But they got a summer, a Christmas, and a spring that he had come close to canceling in advance because he didn't dare count on them. What he says today is: "I grieved for a year while she was alive. That didn't make the grief afterward any smaller. But it meant that I had been there."

Four very different outcomes. Two of them hard. One of them without any ending. But in all four stories, there was a period where the only thing to do was to remain standing. And that is the period this article has been about.

For reflection

Try for a moment not to ask: "How do I get more certainty?" Ask instead:

Where in my life am I currently spending the most energy on not knowing?

What is this uncertainty doing to my thoughts, my feelings, my willpower – and where do I feel it in my body?

Is there something in my life I have lost without anyone – including myself – acknowledging it as a loss?

And if I don't need to solve the entire future today – what is my next honest, loving, and responsible step?

Perhaps freedom does not begin the day we finally know how everything ends. Perhaps it begins when we discover that we can live meaningfully, lovingly, and present – even while something remains unresolved.

When uncertainty cannot be borne alone

Sometimes uncertainty becomes more than a person can bear – especially if it settles on top of previous burdens, active addiction, a grief that won't let go, or thoughts of not wanting to live. Then the task is not more exercises. Then the task is to reach out: to your GP, to a psychotherapist, to a person you trust – or to Livslinien on 70 201 201 if thoughts become dark. Asking for help is not the opposite of resilience. It is part of it.

Professional basis

The article is based on HjerteDialog's work with the tripartite model of thought–feeling–will, the nervous system's regulation model, attachment, relational regulation, addiction as an attempted solution, and the courage to remain standing in unresolved states – supplemented by research on intolerance of uncertainty and tolerance of ambiguity, stress physiology, ambiguous loss and complicated grief, anticipatory grief in relatives, relational uncertainty and adult attachment, autonomic nervous system regulation, late effects of early adversity, stress and relapse, as well as uncertainty during remand custody.

References

Knud Thorbjørn Hansen · HjerteDialog.dk