The World Is a Lot Right Now.
The year’s end can feel like a swirling storm of loose ends, unanswered questions, and unfinished plans. The constant churn of uncertainty can weigh heavy, pulling you into a spiral of “what ifs” and “not enoughs.”
For late-diagnosed neurodivergent women, uncertainty doesn’t just sit outside us—it weaves into our thoughts, our bodies, and our sense of self. Yet, in the face of all this complexity, there’s a surprising way forward: commitment. Not the kind that adds pressure, but the kind that creates space.
What if the commitment isn’t to fixing the uncertainty, but to making time to meet it?
Time holds the power to unravel the knots of uncertainty. A little at a time, it gives us ease to breathe, space to process, and clarity to see what’s next.
Mind: Get Curious About the Complexity of Small Things.
Uncertainty can feel enormous, but the secret to navigating it lies in something beautifully small. Pause to notice one thing—a shadow moving across the wall, the delicate folds of a flower, the way steam curls from your tea. Let yourself wonder: What’s really happening here?
In these tiny moments, the complexity of life unfolds—not as something overwhelming, but as a reminder that patterns emerge when we give ourselves time to notice. Each small moment holds its own mystery and beauty, inviting us to meet uncertainty with gentle curiosity, one breath at a time.
Heart: Commit to Small Returns.
Commitment isn’t about grand gestures; it’s about showing up again and again, even when it feels messy. Reach out to someone you trust. Share a thought, a feeling, or just a moment. These small returns to connection remind you that you don’t have to hold uncertainty alone.
Because actually, much of the time, nobody knows what they’re doing, and everybody is doing the best they can. In reaching out, you remind us all that time for curious, caring connection is also an important commitment.
Body: Move Toward Spaciousness.
Ease isn’t about ignoring tension—it’s about noticing it and inviting space. Stand, stretch, or simply place your hand on your heart. Imagine the rhythm of your breath softening the edges of whatever feels tight or uncertain. A couple of slow breaths can be enough to reset, creating just a little more space. Then, continue with what you’re doing.
Let this be an invitation to return, again and again. Commitment lies less in intensity and more in consistency—a gentle showing up for yourself, moment by moment.
This week, I’m spotlighting Sinking into Neurodivergent Success, a series of audios to guide you in reflecting and wondering what ease and success can feel like in your body.
It’s an invitation to take time—your time—to sense what truly matters to you and remember what it is you’re truly committing to. Learn more here
In other news:
- Rest, Reflect, Rewire Retreat planning is well underway.
- Save the date 2-5 May 2025.
- Details coming in the new year.
- Read more below:
- Affirmation for distracted neurodivergent women,
- My reflections on how I learned something surprising about commitment this week,
- OOREI poem – managing uncertainty with commitment.
A Moment to Notice.
Right now, notice the passage of time in your body. The steady in-and-out of your breath. The beat of your heart. These rhythms remind you that time is already here, offering its spaciousness.
A Question for You:
What’s one small way you can commit to time this week—to pause, return, and create space for ease? I’d love to hear your thoughts—hit reply and share.
Encouragement for Sensitive Souls.
Dear one, commitment isn’t about forcing certainty into the unknown. It’s about choosing to show up for the moment, over and over, with gentleness and presence.
Let’s navigate this season together, finding spaciousness in the midst of uncertainty, one moment at a time.
Many neurodivergent women love to open the box of uncertainty and drama. Because curious!!!! What would happen if … and Into the rabbit hole she goes.
We are also conditioned to sticking to the plan, relentlessly. Trivialising anything else as a distraction, of no import or value.
This undermines our ability to enrich any moment with depth and complexity.
I invite you to remember that you can choose when to enhance any experience with all the depth and complexity you bring. You hold both the fixed and the unknown.
What would it feel like to open that box of duality?
Inside Sinking into Neurodivergent Success you’re guided to do exactly that, and to discover the unexpected delights awaiting you.
This week I have faced the sobering reality that I probably need to get a better paying job to create some certainty and stability in my own life.
The prospect has seemed very daunting, because I felt completely clueless about preparing a CV and cover letter, even when I discovered a surprisingly appealing Heritage Library Officer opening.
I remembered that i had some skillful friends to call on, so I reached out to them for technical and moral support.
Fortunately, there was also plenty of time to prepare the application. Weeks. What a luxury.
I even went on a reconnaissance mission to have a look at the location.
I asked ChatGPT for help with the application, but most of its response was making stuff up and mirroring back the job requirements, which is what freaks me out in the first place.
Finally, I took the time to sit down and look at the various parts of the description, to sort them in ways that made sense to me, and to which I could make a response.
Funnily enough, in the middle of this ongoing process, I had randomly been reading about the end of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. One of the articles commented on Swift’s appeal that she is not actually the very best at anything she does, but she is great at a lot of things, and the combination is irresistible to millions of fans.
Somehow, indirectly, this enabled me to recognise that while I am certainly not the best Librarian in the world, I do have a broad range of skills and experience, drawn from both professional and voluntary roles, and across sectors, over nearly 40 years (if you count the minimum wage retail and service roles i started in)
Then I was able to sit down and write an astonishingly confident cover letter, outlining my range of skills and experience in detail, because I’ve actually done the work. Even some corporate sounding jargon came back to me.
When I asked ChatGPT to write a resume based on the cover letter, I got a much more satisfying response.
For sure it all needs polishing, and I’ll take it back to my recruiter friend for feedback, but I have now achieved something that has eluded me for years, in the summarising of my unique personal professional competence.
Of course I don’t know that I’ll get the job, because there are a whole lot of variables beyond my control in that process, but I’m feeling much more sure of my ability to apply for another suitable position, should the need arise.
And I’m just feeling better about myself, because I have put in writing some of what it is I do and have been doing for decades in the real world.
So that long term commitment, steady building of competence and confidence through working, knowing what I am doing and claiming that, was ultimately able to meet and overcome the uncertainty of can I show up for this new opportunity/position.
I invite you into a similar reflection, should you need it, to enable you to face any dramas, personal or professional during the holiday period.
Remember that you are competent. You’ve been showing up and doing the work for years, if not decades.
You may or may not be the best in show, but you have a unique and compelling skillset that will set you up for meaningful success when you need it most.
Give yourself time to absorb information and make sense of it, call on friends and supporters, then name what you are willing and able to do. Rinse and repeat.
Remember you can call on your history and broader culture to support you. You don’t have to find everything in yourself in this minute.
You’ve got this.
Wishing you – and me! – wonderful holidays. Please take one (holiday, that is)
“Sinking into neurodivergent success”
could help you recognise where you’re ready to take that break and what it would feel like.
Anchored stream of consciousness poem below
(OOREI form “made up” by slam poet Beau Sia)
With gratitude to @AprilLDiaz for the title inspiration.
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Where’s your commitment?
What’s uncertain?
If the outside is uncertain
Commit to the inner vision
If the inner vision is unclear
Commit to seeing truly what is going on around you.
What else is there to say?
Ironically, I am uncertain
And I am committed to speaking to this
So will trust the words that emerge from uncertainty.
Manage uncertainty with commitment
It’s easy to fall into the trap of the mirror
Uncertainty around, uncertainty within
What’s going on?
Nobody knows
That is a spiral downward into chaos
LOL. Gravity is the commitment that is imposed
Goes both ways too,
Manage commitment with uncertainty.
And i think i have been managed that way
Is that manipulation?
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Building strength of commitment over time
It’s a muscle, as they say.
Use it or lose it
What are you committed to?
Don’t let that be a singularity
Commitment points to uncertainty
By its very existence
Commitment means uncertainty is near.
And similarly
Uncertainty means commitment is near.
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Inside, outside, upside, down
Some directions are more comfortable than others
We commit to the known by default
It takes courage to commit to the unknown
Ooooh, that is the diagonal
What happens when I commit to uncertainty
The thrall of uncertainty is broken
Now i can dance
While commitment is rigid for fear of uncertainty
It is only half the equation
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Turn commitment towards uncertainty
That is a phase shift
Usually commitment might avoid uncertainty
Point away from it, run away from it.
There’s always more uncertainty
But it can be managed with commitment
Commitment means showing up over time
Again and again
Seeing the patterns that emerge from uncertainty
The probabilities
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Show up again and again at the coalface of doubt
Until it becomes familiar and known
There is always more questions
For every question answered
Commit to what is beyond uncertainty
Through uncertainty and doubt
Gosh, what would that be?
What is here now, and has always been
Is that me? Myself? My unfolding life?
Certain uncertain, committed, doubtful
Manage uncertainty with commitment
The through line of self
Spirit, story, skin (thank you uncle paul)
Bring experience to what is unknown
Bring what is consistent to meet what is inconsistent
Set a timer dammit
I don’t like open ended descents into wandering
10 minutes more.
Now the egg timer ticks
Lol i was uncertain how much further to go
Now i am committed to 10 minutes
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Face what i do not know how to do
Armed with what I do know
Seeking the limit of my capacity – unknown
With a commitment to respecting my capacity – felt
I dont want to keep going
I don’t know what will show up
I can feel the resistance within
The mental struggle with staying the course
This is not a promise of ease
It is a path, a process of damage control
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Commit to values, greater than
Bridge the gaps of uncertainty with wings
It’s not not scary. It’s still scary
But I am not alone.
The leap is about more than myself
More than my fears of the dark
My personal uncertainty
Balanced by commitment to the greater good
Ooof. the greater good. Who even knows what that is
And yet I am committed to it, in uncertainty.
Manage uncertainty with commitment
LOL. Jump in. See it through.
Begin, continue, shift, evolve, iterate
Beginners mind does not know
Beginners mind is all about uncertainty
Knows only that it does not know
There is a commitment to uncertainty.
The paradox that splits open the experience
What is this?
Who am i that experiences it?
How does it feel?
Manage uncertainty with commitment
Curiosity emerges
Rather than resistance, ignorance, avoidance
I do not know where we are going
But let’s go together.
Commit to each other
To humanity, to greater than
Commitment to resolving conflict
Piece by piece, as long as it takes
Uncertainty of otherness
Commitment to togetherness
Manage uncertainty with commitment
What is uncertain now?
The bell has rung
Time is up. There is always more
The clock ticks away.
Commitment to being with the uncertainty.
Management does not mean suppression
What if manage means meet?
What if management responds to uncertainty
What if to manage is a commitment
to hold Space for uncertainty
Initial ChatGPT prompt:
Transform the anchored stream of consciousness poem below into a relatable everyday embodiment encouragement blog post/email for late diagnosed AuDHD women. Use my friendly, slightly awkward tone of voice. Open with a reflection about all the uncertainty in the world today, and at the end of the year, and how it could drag you down into chaos. Include one suggestion for curious mind, one for connected heart and one for creative body. Outline one moment to notice. with an engagement question. Close with balanced encouragement for sensitive readers, inviting them to stay open to following wondering, without feeling pressured to be fixed.
