Making Peace with Ambiguity

I'd like to invite you to adopt an approach to life called negative capability that I have found useful in my life. 

Negative capability is "the willingness to embrace uncertainty, live with mystery, and make peace with ambiguity."

The concept was coined by the poet Keats in the early nineteenth century as a rebuttal to society's insistence on definitive answers. 

In the last two hundred years its application has expanded. 

Take the modern day example of engaging in difficult conversations about diversity, identity, power, privilege, exclusion, equity, belonging. . .

Often, because people lack familiarity (let alone fluency) with these topics, they choose to disengage from important conversations that need to happen if we are to make progress. 

The root of this fragility is usually fear, pride, and/or arrogance, all of which are signs of discomfort, which leads to disengaging from the conversation, which leads to lack of learning, which leads to a preservation of the status quo. 

Which leads to continued exclusion and marginalization, which leads to distrust, which leads to low motivation and engagement, which leads to less innovation and productivity, which leads to poor business results. . .

Wow! All that because we are uncomfortable being uncomfortable. 

What a shame.