Doubt

[Binktopia]

Why is life nothing but doubt?

Are the best decisions always the ones you feel good about? What about the gut wrenching ones, do they work out better than expected?

Are you ever truly not at a crossroads between possibility and desire and reality? Like where you are like, yeah, this is good, I don't need to search for more. If I could move to a city with 100,000 people, that might be good. But I don't know if I have the drive to do that.

If I stay where I am, I know what I am most likely to get, I am not sure that is enough. Enough career wise, enough social wise, enough possibility wise.

But it has grown comfortable, and I have more now with a job than I have ever had before. The recession crushed me, man.

I am making plans, and it all seems like a bunch of trade offs, nothing really excites me about any of it.

is that OK? I mean, I have ideas of what I can do with my time to become a stronger, wiser and hopefully better human being.

So much confusion.

[morlac]

Less Doubt more Hope. Go for what you want but do it full of hope and not doubt. Better chance at success.

[hepcat]

The dark times make the good times that much better. At least that's how I always look at it. And good times will come. Probably not consistently, but enough so that you'll weather the dark times and look forward to a break in the clouds.

[Smoove_B]

From my calendar this morning:

Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be?

[Kraken]

Wife and I had the retirement discussion again this morning. Every time we do this we cover the same ground without deciding on a goal. We like living where we are, but this house is not elder-friendly and making it so would cost probably >$150k. Moving somewhere else assumes that we cash out of this house and use that money to buy another; if we're going to upgrade to a bigger/better/newer one, we have to move someplace where houses are cheaper. We currently live in a city with the best health care in the US; moving away as we near our 70s seems unwise. We would both like to live in the Berkshires at least part of the year, and housing prices are moderately lower there...but we definitely don't want to spend winters there. Which raises the question of winter destinations...at the moment, that usually settles around Ashville NC, a place we haven't actually ever been but that seems to check most of our boxes. It's easy to rule out conventional retirement meccas -- we both hate FL, and neither of us want to live in a desert, or in a deep red state -- but it's a lot harder to rule anyplace in.

Ideally, we'd split most of the year between here and the Berkshires and spend the winter in [warm place]. But owning/renting/moving between three different bases is almost surely too expensive, and (not to go full Drazzil) we have two outdoor cats who will be traumatized wherever we go and whatever we do, so that's yet another complication.

Meanwhile, the clock keeps ticking. Our house will be paid off in 3.5 years. We'll both be at full SS retirement age in 4.5 years. Wife can retire from her job with full pension and bennies in 5 years. By then we'll be in our late 60s, and the prospect of rearranging our lives and moving at that age is daunting. The older we get, the more likely health crises become. Decisions must be made soon and carried out within the next 4-5 years, but all options have pluses and minuses. And we only get one shot at getting it right -- wherever we go next will almost surely be the last place we live.

So yeah...doubt.

[Scuzz]

We have talked about moving to a nicer climate (less heat) and maybe somewhere near the coast. Our house is almost paid off and we are about 2 years from both being fully retired. But nothing can happen until my FIL passes (I don't wish for that) and it seems like the longer we wait the less likely any move will ever take place.

But as for doubt, I have never worried about whether ulimatly a decision was the best one or not. That is not really a luxery that the average person can have. You make you decisions as best you can and you live with it. If it turns out horrible you revisit it and make changes if need be. But doubting that decision unduly only leads to more doubt.

[Trent Steel]

In Zen practice, the essential point is to rouse doubt. What is this doubt? When you are born, for example, where do you come from? You cannot help but remain in doubt about this. When you die, where do you go? Again, you cannot help but remain in doubt.

Since you cannot pierce this barrier of life and death, suddenly doubt will coalesce right before your eyes. Try to put it down, you cannot; try to push it away, you cannot. Eventually you will break through this doubt block and realize what a worthless notion life and death is—ha! As the old worthies said, "Great doubt, great awakening; no doubt, no awakening."

[Jeff V]

Doubt is something I have in the plans and machinations of others. Personally, if I have reason to doubt a given course of action will not achieve the desired outcome, then it's time to reassess.

In terms of retirement planning, I do doubt I'll live long enough to achieve my wife's ideal retirement plan for us.

[Holman]

Doubt is worry about choice. But choice is unavoidable; even trying not to choose (or putting it off) is a choice.

We moderns expect ourselves to be maximally efficient, so we experience every choice as a test of our worthiness. Difficult or unexpected results (which we call "failures") feel like demerits against our lives. We force ourselves to suffer from them as personal/moral/psychological punishments rather than just as new circumstances that we have to navigate.

Ancient people (who had very few of our cushions and advantages) understood this better. They knew things could happen outside of their control, and they adapted. Our world is sold as so fully inside our control that we've forgotten this.

Make your choices as best as you can with the best you can know. That's all you can do. Hindsight is passive.

[gameoverman]

My philosophy on Doubt:

The only way to have no doubt about something is if you know everything. No one knows everything so everyone has some level of doubt.

Some people seem to have no doubt but that's not the truth of it. The truth of it is that if you don't care about something then doubt doesn't exist in regards to that thing. Example, let's say I need to hire a new employee. I may have doubts I'm making the right choice UNLESS I don't care how the new employee works out. If I think "I'll just fire him and hire another one" then there's no doubt involved.

[Anonymous Bosch]

As Carnegie famously put it:

“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.”

[Jeff V]

As Carnegie famously put it:

“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.”

Absolutely. As a manager, I best keep doubts to myself anyway, although I rarely doubt actions that come from my own convictions.