Believe it or not, I used to be one of those toxic productivity coaches. I’d set goals, crush them, and then preach about how others could do the same. I even taught people how to “own their mornings.” Oh, I have a book called Good Morning: How To Win Your Day(still on Amazon). But behind the curtain, I was quietly shaming myself every night, wondering why some of my to-dos kept sneaking onto the next day’s list. These days, life laughs at my plans more than I do. Just this very afternoon, I had dinner clearly figured out—Nigerian-style rice, which meant having some good ata-dindin with dodo(plantains), all ingredients neatly scheduled for a Publix delivery. Yet, as I write this, I’m almost certain my dinner plans are down the drain.

Yesterday was no different. I drove to the dealership for a simple oil change. Simple oil change! I budgeted seventy dollars, and even padded it with an extra twenty, just in case the economy and Trump tarriffs had other plans for my wallet. Well, I walked out of the dealership without my car and with a $3,000 invoice for “discovered damages.” My gosh! Don’t these surprises just keep coming?

But that’s the thing: there’s absolutely nothing that’s certain. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! Yet, we want to somehow peg things into the ground to give it as much certainty. And lately, this has emerged into one of the most beautiful practices for me— an adoration of the Unknowing. You see, Not knowing is by itself a type of prayer. It is the quiet turning of the mind toward what it cannot grasp. Don’t you see that now, more than ever, we live most days reaching for understanding, rushing to tie loose ends, and stacking answers like bricks to make our lives feel solid. Yet, in most of our experiences, when we feel the most alive, it is when the mind pauses, when we gosh at the beautiful pastels of the skies, or when we are tickled by the laughter of a baby, or when we frozen from the kiss of a lover. In these times of short freezes, certainty dissolves and we are opened up to something vast, tender and yet wild.

By the general nature of the mind, it seeks knowledge. It longs to KNOW. It believes knowledge will secure it, that understanding will complete it, that explanations will relieve it. It chases explanations the way a child chases butterflies- never still long enough to notice the air itself. And yet, every answer it finds leads to another question, and soon the pursuit itself becomes a cage. Tell me you have not yet clearly seen this! Tell me! And so, the more we know, the more we defend our knowing. The more we defend our knowing, the less we see.

So the practice of Not Knowing, this(what I will now dub the Prayer of Not Knowing) is a call to intimacy with what unfolds as it unfolds without a need to force it our way. It means sitting with life without needing to define it. It means letting a sunset be light, not language. It means hearing someone’s pain and resisting the urge to fix it. It means trusting that reality is already whole without any labels. In not knowing, the mind loosens, the heart softens, and life shows itself as it is: unfolding, mysterious, kind.

Now, I am not saying not to have wishes for what we want our lives to be like. Oh, no! There’s a fine line here if you can bend a bit lower to see what I am putting out here. It’s seeing that our wishes, preferences are also a part of this divine play that we can clearly honor. But it’s also knowing that in the fulfillment or not-fulfillment of them, what we are(whatever this that we are is) transcends even these desires. The sweetest spot in all experience lies here. It is in the bowing to what exceeds us and what we exceed. I swear, there is a quiet joy that comes when you realize you do not need to hold the world together. Even if you tried, you…could…never! We can rest in the Unknown and call it worship. We can let our questions be our songs. We can let silence be our teacher.

When we stop clinging to answers, even for a moment, the world becomes spacious again. The trees are no longer “trees.” They are shimmering presences. The wind is no longer “air in motion.” It is this mysterious movement without explanation. We begin to see that we have never really known anything, and that this is not a failure but grace.

To live in not knowing is to fall in love with the infinite. It is to live as wonder itself, humble, alive, and free. It is to trust God.

Contemplative Exercise: The Practice of Not Knowing

* Sit somewhere quiet. Let your body settle. Let your breath become natural. Do not try to focus on anything. Let attention rest as it is, open and unhurried. Feel the weight of your body on the chair or floor. Feel the gentle rhythm of breathing.

* After a few minutes, notice how the mind wants to fill the space. It searches for meaning, something to do, something to conclude. It may even ask ‘what the heck is this exercise going to do’. Watch it reach for thoughts and explanations. Gently notice it’s behaviour and the subtle tension it carries. But notice that you are noticing.

* Open your eyes and look around. See shapes and colors without calling them anything. Hear sounds without naming their source. Taste, smell, and feel without dividing experience into categories(for as long or short as you can). Allow perception to exist raw, before language. Notice how peaceful it is when you stop insisting on meaning.

* Between one thought and the next, there is a small space(don’t overthink it). Rest there. That is not knowing. It is not confusing. It is awareness before it attaches. Stay a little longer each time you notice it. Let it expand like the light of dawn.

* Now, whisper inwardly: “I do not need to know right now. All I have to be is here right now” Feel how freeing that is. This is the surrender I refer to. It’s surrender without defeat. It is reverence for Mystery itself. It is what it means to walk with God.

* When you are ready, bring your attention back to your breath. Let gratitude arise for this unknowing that allows everything to be.

* End with silence.

Repeat this practice often. Over time, the Unknown becomes friend, and you can join me in practice as we become less demanding of certainty, living in the open sky of wonder.

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