Uncertainty

‘Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security. (John Allen Paulos)

I had an important conversation with an impressive young woman from Malaysia this afternoon. As we shared examples of our various cross-cultural experiences with people and groups from different parts of the world, she mentioned an impact of a Judeo-Christian worldview on culture that I hadn’t really considered before. A belief that God created the world, both with a purpose and with a fundamental principle of order to it, leads to an assumption that things happen for a reason and, furthermore, that there are causal factors that lay behind whatever does happen.

Take now, by contrast, an alternative and, say, fatalistic belief system in which things just are as they are. I remember speaking with a community development worker from the UK who worked with rural leather-working communities in Nepal. When he attempted to introduce methods such as adding lime during treatment to preserve the leather, and furthermore demonstrated the results, the local people didn’t appear to see any connection between the adding of the lime and the absence of mould. It was as if whatever happened (or not) just happened (or not).

Drawing a parallel, this woman today went on to explain that older generations often criticise the lack of stickability of today’s younger generations and attribute it to, say, fickleness, laziness or a lack of resilience. The former grew up with mantras such as, ‘If you study hard, you’ll get a better job’, or, ‘If you work hard, you’ll get a promotion/better pay.’ And often this was the case. Yet to young people now, the world looks and feels chaotic and unpredictable. It can often seem that to succeed (or not) is simply a matter of privilege or luck. 'So what’s the point of putting hard work in?'

This contemporary contextual and cultural phenomenon is, alarmingly, a socio-psychological breeding ground for fundamentalist and reductionist ideologies, including in political spheres, that offer, as if by some divine miracle, a reassuring sense of simplicity, certainty, purpose and belonging. If a person or group feels all at-sea in life and an overwhelming sense of anxiety that goes with it, they may well grasp instinctively at and cling onto whomever presents a vision of safe and solid ground. Against this backdrop, false messiahs are emerging as leaders all over the world.