131. Healing Requires Uncertainty – Learning to Trust What You Can’t See

We’re wired to crave certainty. Especially after betrayal, when everything familiar suddenly feels fragile, we reach for something solid, answers, guarantees, anything that promises safety.

But here’s the truth: You don’t need certainty to heal. You need self-trust.

In this episode, I explore how your relationship with uncertainty is the very foundation of growth, clarity, and transformation. Because while control might feel comforting, real peace comes from knowing you can handle the unknown, even without a clear map.

Whether you’re asking “Should I stay or go?”, “Will I ever be okay?”, or “How do I know they won’t do it again?” this conversation is for you.

Key Takeaways:

• Why your brain craves certainty, and how that instinct can keep you stuck.

• The emotional cost of trying to control outcomes you can’t guarantee.

• How clinging to the familiar blocks growth, healing, and self-discovery.

• Why self-trust matters more than clarity, and how to build it.

• A simple mindset shift to help you walk with the unknown instead of fighting it.

💬 Reflection questions:

Where are you waiting for certainty before taking action? What’s one courageous step you could take without needing the whole map?

Connect with Luke:

• Website: www.lifecoachluke.com

• Instagram: @mylifecoachluke

• Email: luke@lifecoachluke.com

Join the After the Affair community at www.facebook.com/groups/aftertheaffaircommunity

Episode Transcript:

The After The Affair podcast with me, Luke Shillings is here to help you process, decide, and move forward on purpose following infidelity. Together we'll explore what's required to rebuild trust not only in yourself. But also with others. Whether you stay or leave, I can help. And no matter what your story, there will be something here for you.

Let's go.

Hello and welcome back to the After The Affair podcast. I'm your host, Luke Schillings, and today you are listening to episode number 131. I want to talk about something that might sound uncomfortable, uh, maybe even counterintuitive, but it is absolutely essential for healing after betrayal uncertainty.

Now, if you are anything like most of my clients or honestly most humans, you've probably been trying to get out of uncertainty since the moment your world was turned upside down. You're searching for clarity, control, predictability, and that's understandable, but here's the truth. Your relationship with uncertainty will determine how far you'll grow.

That's what this episode is all about. Healing requires uncertainty. Why we fear the unknown, and how that fear keeps us stuck, and how learning to walk with uncertainty rather than trying to eliminate it is the real key to transformation. Betrayal, shatters. The internal map that we thought we were living. We thought that we knew where we were going, who we were with, and what life looked like.

Then one decision, one discovery, it tears that certainty apart. And what do we do in response? We try to rebuild it any way that we can. Should I stay or should I leave? Can I trust them again? Will this ever feel normal? We obsess over answers, but what we're really doing is trying to escape the discomfort of not knowing.

We tell ourselves we can't move forward until we're certain. But here's the trap. Certainty isn't a prerequisite for healing. It's what healing gives us access to over time. So let's break it down. From an evolutionary standpoint, uncertainty meant danger. If you didn't know what was around the corner, it could be a predator, a threat, or something that risks your survival.

So our brains evolved to treat the unknown with suspicion, hesitation, and high alert. It kept us alive. Fast forward to today, and while the world has changed our nervous systems, they haven't, we're not being stalked by lions anymore, but our brain responds to emotional uncertainty almost the same way it did to physical threat.

It activates our stress response, tightens our muscles, and starts scanning for danger. Why? Because to the primitive brain. Not knowing is inherently unsafe. This is sometimes referred to as low uncertainty tolerance. It's our inability to sit with the unknown without panicking or rushing to fix it. And when betrayal happens, this low tolerance gets amplified.

Your partner's actions disrupted what you thought was safe. Your future feels suddenly unpredictable. You don't know what the next week, month, or year will look like anymore. So what do we do? We grasp for anything familiar. We think, I know this hurts, but at least I understand it. Or I know this relationship is broken, but I can't bear the thought of starting over.

And before we know it, we're choosing certainty over growth just because it's easier to understand the pain we're in than face the unknown of something new. But here's the catch. Growth doesn't happen in certainty. Growth happens in stretching. Think about it. Every major breakthrough in your life probably came after a period of discomfort, a period of doubt or risk you didn't grow because you knew exactly how everything would turn out.

You grew because you kept moving. So if you are feeling stuck right now, if you are afraid to make a decision because you can't see the outcome, remember the goal isn't to eliminate uncertainty. It's to increase your capacity to walk through it. That's where the healing happens. That's where the strength is built, and that's where you find the version of yourself who no longer needs guarantees to feel grounded.

Here's a metaphor I love. Clinging to certainty is like holding your breath underwater. It might feel safe for a moment. It's controlled, contained, but eventually your lungs burn. You have to come up for air, you have to move, release, rise at first. Holding your breath gives the illusion of control. You're bracing, you're managing, you're delaying discomfort, but that control is temporary.

Because the longer you hold on, the more the pressure builds and eventually it becomes unbearable. This is exactly what happens when we cling to certainty After Betrayal. We convince ourselves that we'll feel better when we have the answers. When I know what they want. When I know if they're going to leave, when I know if I can forgive, when I know if I'll be okay.

But here's the truth. Those answers rarely come on the timeline that we want. That's if they come at all, and in the meantime, we're holding our breath, waiting, freezing, postponing life. And just like underwater, there comes a point where the holding itself becomes the problem. You are not hurting because of what you don't know.

You are hurting because of your resistance to not knowing. Eventually, you have to let go, not because you've figured everything out, but because staying stuck in place is slowly suffocating you. When you release the need for certainty, something shifts, you start breathing again. You come up for air, you start choosing based on what aligns with your values, not based on what you can guarantee.

You allow life to unfold even when the destination isn't visible yet, and that's where healing really begins. Not in the answers, but in the courage to live without them. Because healing isn't about getting back to what's familiar. It's about learning to trust yourself in the unfamiliar, and that starts the moment you stop holding your breath and decide to swim.

Let me tell you about Hannah. She was in a 23 year marriage when she found out her husband had been having an affair. Her world collapsed overnight. At first, she clung to every possible point of control, reading obsessively, trying to predict his next move, trying to fix things before they fell apart completely, but nothing brought her peace.

The turning point came when she admitted that she didn't know what would happen next. She didn't know if they'd stayed together. She didn't know if she'd ever trust again, and instead of panicking. She decided to start walking anyway, in the end, Hannah left the marriage. She questioned her lifelong values.

She faced assumptions that she didn't even realise that she was carrying. And you know what? On the other side of that mist, that fog was something stronger, something calmer, and more grounded than she ever imagined. So many people come to me asking questions that sound like they're about clarity, but underneath are really about control.

How do I know if it's right to stay? How do I find, how do I know if they'll cheat Again, how do I know if I'll be okay? And here's the most honest and perhaps the most uncomfortable answer. You don't, you can't. You can weigh the risks, you can assess the evidence, you can talk it through, but no matter how much logic or reassurance you gather, you'll never be able to guarantee the outcome.

And that doesn't mean you're doing it wrong. It means you are human. We want to believe that if we just ask the right question, if we just wait long enough, if we just think hard enough, we'll eventually know. But life doesn't work that way, especially not after betrayal. When trust has been broken, your brain wants black and white answers.

Certainty feels like safety, but the work of healing isn't about getting the answers. It's about becoming the kind of person who can move forward without them. That's the real transformation. You stop needing certainty to feel safe. You realise that waiting for perfect clarity is keeping you trapped, and that taking action even imperfectly creates the safety you are looking for.

You stop outsourcing your peace to outcomes. You can't control your nervous system. Calms not because someone else is being consistent, but because you are, you show up for yourself and that becomes your anchor. And then you can start developing real self-trust, not the kind of trust that says, I know how everything will turn out, but the kind that says, no matter how things turn out, I'll handle it.

I'll keep choosing. I'll keep becoming. This is the shift from fragile certainty to grounded confidence from needing to know, to learning how to navigate. From fearing the unknown to discovering your own capacity inside it, because the truth is you were never meant to know everything. You were meant to live anyway.

And every time you do something brave without guarantee, whether it's setting a boundary, having a hard conversation, or choosing to stay or go, you're not just healing, you're becoming someone you trust, and that will take you further than certainty. Ever could have done. So let's talk about the shift from control to courage.

You don't need to control your future to create a meaningful one. You just need to take one step, then another, then another. Try this. Grab a pen and paper. Name one area in your life right now where you are clinging to the familiar, and ask yourself, what am I afraid of if I let go? Then maybe you could ask what might be possible if I choose courage over control.

Now, take one small action that moves you in the direction of growth, not certainty. If you've been waiting for clarity before you act, here's your reminder. Clarity doesn't become before the decision. It comes afterwards. You don't need to have the full map. You just need to take the next step. The path will unfold as you walk it, and every single step into the unknown is a vote for the kind of person that you are becoming courageous, resilient, and grounded.

The future isn't found in certainty. It's built through choice, and choice only lives in the present moment. If this episode resonated with you, I'd love to hear from you. What's one area where you've been clinging to certainty. And what's one step that you can take today to walk with the unknown? Instead, if you're ready to take a deeper step into healing, then visit lifecoachluke.com to learn more.

Thank you ever so much for listening. And remember, you don't need to know where the path leads. You just need to trust that you can handle where it takes you. I'll speak to you all again next week. Take care.