Should You Move? Have Kids? Change Careers? Science-Backed Frameworks For Every Hard Decision

May 13, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

The Science of Making Hard Decisions When You Can't Know the Outcome

The most stressful scenario isn't a guaranteed bad outcome—it's not knowing. One study found that people would rather receive a certain painful electric shock than face a 50-50 chance of getting one. The fear of a layoff does more psychological damage than the layoff itself. The period between a biopsy and getting results is often harder for cancer patients than chemotherapy or surgery. Our brains are wired to treat uncertainty as a threat, and in a world where the five highest measurements of global uncertainty since the 1980s have all occurred in the last five years, that wiring is getting overloaded.

Why Uncertainty Tolerance Is a Skill You Can Build

Simon Estolzov, author of How to Know: The Value of Uncertainty in a World That Demands Answers, argues that uncertainty tolerance works like a muscle—it can be strengthened with practice, and doing so reduces anxiety, improves decision-making, and opens up opportunities that certainty-seeking behavior closes off. The internet has made this harder: it floods us with global crises while robbing us of the practice of sitting with what we don't know. Estolzov describes feeling an involuntary need to look up an actor's name during a movie in theaters, a compulsion that didn't exist a decade ago.

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What you'll learn

1 (00:52) **Guest Introduction: Simon Estolzov and His Framework** - Liz introduces Simon Estolzov, a journalist for the NYT and Atlantic, and author of the new book *How to Not Know*, which tackles building tolerance for uncertainty.
2 (04:28) **The Core Benefit: Anxiety Mitigation & Opportunity** - Simon lays out why raising uncertainty tolerance is an adaptive skill.
3 (06:09) **The "Year of Living Dangerously" Experiment** - A concrete story of a couple facing a one-way door decision.
4 (10:16) **The Fallacy of Prediction** - Research showing that experts and our own "affective forecasting" are deeply flawed.
5 (14:26) **The Decision Tree for Acute Uncertainty** - A practical framework for handling immediate, resolvable unknowns.
6 (17:32) **The Struggle with Contingency Planning** - Addressing the emotional resistance to preparing for unwanted outcomes.
7 (19:46) **Acceptance and the Upside of Uncertainty** - How to shift from seeing uncertainty as a threat to seeing it as serendipity.

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

Did you know our brains are wired to fear uncertainty MORE than suffering? The good news is that in the same way you can build muscles, you can build your tolerance for the unknown. When you’re comfortable with uncertainty, you’ll be less anxious, go after more opportunities, find more success, and make better decisions. And that is exactly what you're going to learn how to do today.

My guest is Simone Stolzoff, a famous journalist and best-selling author, who dives into the learnings and stories from his new book How To Not Know: The Value of Uncertainty in a World That Demands Answers.

🎧 What you’ll learn:

• How to stop catastrophizing and start planning

• The three "certainty traps" keeping you stuck

• How to make hard decisions before you're "ready"

• The one question to ask when you're stuck between two options

• Why your future self is more capable than you think

• How to microdose uncertainty to build your tolerance

Check out our NEW YouTube Channel with tons of YouTube exclusive Shorts and, coming soon, YouTube exclusive podcast content: https://www.youtube.com/@LizMoodyTV

Check out the previous episodes of The Liz Moody Podcast discussed today:

• How To Have No Regrets When You Die with Mega Best-Selling Author Daniel Pink

• Stanford Professors: One Tool That Makes Every Life Decision Easier

If you liked this episode, check out: Stuck? How To Make The Right Decisions & Supercharge Your Path Forward

For more from Simone Stolzoff:

• Book, How To Not Know: https://amzn.to/3QUhqRY

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thepizza_bagel/

• Website: https://simonestolzoff.com/

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