Negative Capability at Work

The Power of Not Knowing

We’re taught to treat uncertainty like a threat. In career decisions especially, we seek guarantees—clear titles, salary ranges, clean trajectories. But knowing isn’t always what clears the path forward.

The Illusion of Certainty

Recently, I approached job listings like a checklist: senior title? Check. Clear salary range? Check. Reputable company? Even better. I filtered aggressively, seeking clarity, because clarity felt like control.

And it got me interviews. Plenty of them.

But something was always off. The roles were impressive on paper, but hollow in feel. What I wanted wasn’t just a better title; I wanted a fit. Alignment. A sense that this next chapter actually made sense for my career.

Still, I kept searching through the lens of certainty.

The Unexpected Pivot

Then came a listing that didn’t quite meet my standards.

Lower title. No listed salary. An unfamiliar company name.

Still, I applied despite the unknowns. 

The CEO scheduled the interview, and something unexpected happened: he offered me what I had been looking for. Not the original role, but something more senior. A principal position, with ownership stake.

The very thing I almost filtered out turned out to be the opportunity that had been waiting for me all along.

What Keats Knew

This is what poet John Keats called negative capability: the ability to hold space for uncertainty and doubt without reaching for immediate resolution.

It’s a term rooted in literature, but profoundly applicable to real life, especially our working lives.

It asks us to resist the cultural addiction to clarity. To stop equating control with security. To allow for questions without needing quick answers.

Most people associate wisdom with knowing. But some of the wisest choices we make are the ones we take without knowing. Because we sense something. We stay open. We move anyway.

Ambition vs. Openness

This isn’t about passivity. It’s not about waiting for life to surprise you while doing nothing.

It’s about being intentional and open. Ambitious and adaptable.

Sometimes we want so badly to be seen a certain way—experienced, accomplished, in control—that we block the pathways that ask us to stretch, question, or imagine more.

That job I almost ignored? It asked me to imagine a role beyond what was written. To show up, despite uncertainty, and see what emerged.

A Different Kind of Confidence

There’s a quiet, unshakeable confidence in not needing all the answers.

In letting the right opportunity reveal itself through interaction, not just description.

In understanding that ambiguity isn’t a void; it’s a space where something new can take root.

Negative capability is not indecision. It’s a deeper kind of wisdom, one that allows your life to surprise you, because you aren’t strangling it with certainty.

The Next Step

We’re all looking for the next right step. But what if the “right” step doesn’t always announce itself with clear direction?

What if it comes disguised, as a gut instinct that says “maybe”?

No one really knows everything—not about their careers, their relationships, or even themselves.

So the pressure isn’t to know. The work is to stay open just long enough to let the unknown do its work.

Because sometimes, what we call uncertainty is just possibility in disguise.