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Merlin and the Magic Wand
March 12, 2026
Article highlights:
- the art of ambiguity
- Merlin, with a wand
Most of us grow up assuming that life should be largely knowable. We look for clarity, certainty, plans, predictions. We want the future to make sense in advance. We want the ground beneath us to feel solid.
Yet in truth, it rarely is. When we look honestly at the nature of things, we realize that very little is actually known.
Most of what we call certain is instead a set of working assumptions. We assume tomorrow will resemble today. We assume the people we love will remain. We assume our bodies will continue as they are, that our plans will unfold more or less as intended.
These assumptions help us feel steady enough to live our lives. Without them we fear the ground might feel too fluid beneath our feet. But events often show us that the ground is fluid and life is a river:
A medical test comes back with troubling results.
A job ends unexpectedly.
Someone we love begins to change in ways we do not understand.
A relationship reaches a crossroads.
A new opportunity appears, full of promise yet impossible to predict.
In truth, ambiguity is our constant companion. It appears in small ways every day and in larger ways at the turning points of our lives.
This is widely known, but rarely well understood. And so — full of anxiety and questions about how things will turn out — we turn to psychics, experts, authorities. Yet there is a place in us that is knowing itself. How seldom we guide ourselves there.
The great wisdom traditions have long recognized this place. Many of their teachings are simply ways of helping us loosen our grip on certainty so we may enter the Great Unknown.
Detachment in the Buddhist path, surrender in the Christian mystical tradition, non-attachment in Hindu philosophy, The Taoist ease of living in the flow. These are all invitations to relax our addiction to the illusion of certainty so we can live more gracefully within not-knowing.
Living artfully with ambiguity is a vital skill — a quiet superpower — and there are simple ways we can cultivate it.
First, pausing before demanding certainty.
When faced with an unclear situation, notice the impulse to immediately resolve it. Instead, allow the unknown to sit beside you or join you in your walk.
Second, becoming “curiouser and curiouser.”
Rather than asking, When will this be over, or How does this turn out? we can frame our daily lives in the context of, I always know as I go. I’m really interested in what is unfolding. The wisdom and answers are contained in the unfolding.
Third, keep your sense of play — life is an improv.
Life is far more improvisational than we generally admit. When we approach the unknown with a little humor and creativity, the ambiguity becomes less frightening and more like an unfolding story.
Fourth, recognize yourself for the explorer you are.
We came to earth knowing our maps would have few details. How could it be different? Your life has never been lived by anyone before.
At the very heart of existence lies a vast and beautiful mystery — the creative force flowing through galaxies, forests, oceans, and through the unfolding of our own lives.
We may call it God, Spirit, Source, the Great Mystery — or simply Life itself. But whatever name we choose, we do not fully know it. Because ambiguity is woven into that deepest truth of all.
Ambiguity is a spiritual orientation. It is the willingness to participate in a universe far more creative, surprising, and alive than our certainties would ever allow.
And perhaps in learning to rest a little more comfortably in the unknown, we begin to discover something quietly reassuring:
The ambiguity we fear is actually the very space in which life is continuously creating itself.
Which means that when we feel lost in the wobble of ambiguity — wondering what comes next, urgently wanting to know — we may not be lost at all.
We may simply be standing where life is still writing the story — where we have much more power than we know.
I sometimes recognize myself there, waving my magic wand about like a child who knows the power of make-believe — but one who is also a Merlin carrying the secrets of gradually unfolding a life that is true.
Looking to the side, I see you are there too waving your wand. And we are giggling.
🤭
Playfully,
💜 Mayet
Mystics Mayet and Stewart Pearce explore - and sink into - the Stillness in unexpected ways.