The Inner Game of Uncertainty
I’ve spent years working with the idea that performance is shaped as much by internal interference as by external conditions. It’s easy to explore that concept in the context of work, leadership, or sport. The stakes feel manageable. The lessons feel transferable.
Then something happens that removes the abstraction.
Recently, I found myself sitting with a pathology report that included a word most people associate with urgency and danger. In that moment, all the frameworks, models, and facilitation language fall away. What remains is the raw experience of attention colliding with uncertainty.
What surprised me was not fear, exactly. It was the speed at which my mind began trying to solve something that wasn’t yet a problem to solve.
The Inner Game describes two internal forces. One is analytical, protective, always scanning for risk and trying to regain control. The other is quieter, more capable, oriented toward observing conditions and responding when necessary. In everyday life, these forces operate in the background. Under pressure, they become visible.
A medical diagnosis creates perfect conditions for the protective system to take over. The stakes feel high. The timeline is unclear. Feedback loops are slow. There is no immediate action that resolves the uncertainty. The mind fills that gap with activity — research, scenario-building, urgency, the search for certainty.
None of that changes the underlying situation. It only changes the internal climate.
When Attention Found Somewhere to Land
What shifted things for me was not reassurance or information. It was attention. When attention moved toward building something meaningful — in my case, articulating ideas about organizational dynamics — the interference lost intensity.
I started writing. Thinking through ideas. Building language around the very dynamics I’ve been describing for years—interference, attention, climate, the way uncertainty changes people and teams. And almost without trying, the internal pressure eased.
The situation hadn’t changed. The report hadn’t changed. The conditions were the same.
The relationship to them had changed.
This clarified something I had only understood intellectually before: the mind keeps working on whatever it is handed. When the only available object is uncertainty, it works on uncertainty. When attention is placed on something constructive, the system stabilizes around that instead.
There is a tendency to interpret calm as denial or avoidance. What I experienced felt different. It was closer to disciplined observation — staying aware of the facts without feeding the narrative that demands immediate resolution.
That posture resembles what medicine calls active surveillance, but it also mirrors a broader performance principle: not every situation improves with immediate intervention. Some improve with clear monitoring and readiness to act when conditions change.
Living with uncertainty exposes how much of our sense of control comes from activity rather than effectiveness. Action can relieve discomfort even when it does nothing to improve outcomes. Restraint can feel passive even when it preserves capability.
In leadership contexts, this dynamic shows up during periods of change. When uncertainty rises, organizations often increase oversight and activity to restore a sense of control. The unintended effect is a climate of caution that reduces the very adaptability needed to navigate the situation.
The internal version is similar. Pressure to resolve uncertainty can narrow attention and reduce perspective. Allowing attention to settle on meaningful, purposeful work restores both.
I don’t see this experience as a lesson about illness.
It feels more like a reminder that the Inner Game isn’t a metaphor. It’s a description of how humans function when stakes are real and timelines are unclear.
Conditions shape experience. Experience shapes behavior. Behavior shapes outcomes.
That sequence doesn’t change just because the context does.
If anything, moments like this reveal how much performance — in life as well as work — depends on where attention is placed when uncertainty enters the room.
