The Comfort of Not Knowing

Frankly, I wasn’t sure how to put this across. It almost felt like a flaw! This need to know the ending before it happens. But then I wondered, what if others do this too? Do they just laugh and move on, or do they ever try to change?

Over the weekend, my husband suggested we watch The Glass Onion – A Knives Out Mystery. He’d already seen it the day before and said he didn’t mind watching it again with me. That itself felt like a glowing review. Who watches a suspense movie back-to-back unless it’s very good? So, we started watching. The kids were asleep (which meant the ice cream was entirely ours. No sharing required), and 45 minutes in, we both decided to call it a night. We blamed it on exhaustion. The “tired young parents” excuse. (Not because we’re old!)

But here’s where it gets embarrassing. Instead of reading a book before bed, my nightly habit, I ended up reading the movie’s entire plot on Wikipedia. The entire plot of a suspense movie! The next morning, when I tried watching it again, I couldn’t enjoy it. I was mentally checking if each scene matched what I’d read.

That reminded me of another unfinished story — The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. I’ve started it at least five times but always stop at the same point. The first time, I accidentally stumbled upon a heart-wrenching passage ahead of time and never could bring myself to read past it again. Yet, when I read The Kite Runner, I cried through the night. My mother saw my swollen eyes the next morning and assumed I’d fought with my then-boyfriend (now husband). When she realized I was crying over a book, she threatened to throw it away if I read the book again. I did pick the book after 3 days when my father had smiled and said something I’ll never forget - “Always read a story from a third person’s view. You’ll understand it better and feel less hurt.”

And he was right. But even with that wisdom, I can’t help wondering: why was I not able to read The God of Small Things? Maybe it’s because, deep down, we all crave for things that feel good. When we know a story will take a turn we dislike, we avoid it. But when we don’t know anything, we’re free to just flow with it.One of the reasons why some of us keep searching for hints about the future. Not because we want to control it, but because uncertainty makes us restless.

As a child, I remember standing before a “robot” at the temple in Srisailam, giving my birthdate and gender to get a printed prediction. Years later, in my twenties, I was tempted to try Chilaka Josyam — the one where a parrot picks a card and someone reads your future from it. My father, of course, was never a fan of these things, he always denied me from doing these things and would say, “What’s meant to happen will happen anyway whether you know it or not.” At the time, it sounded like typical grown-up talk. But now, it makes perfect sense.

As a mother of two toddlers and a once job seeker, my own life often feels like one long unpredictable novel. Some days it’s rejection emails; other days, it’s both my children fighting for the same speck of dust. Amid all this, I’ve realized how grounding routine can be. A small routine like - just walking under the same trees every day, listening to your favourite music, smiling and saying good morning to fellow walkers, gave me a sense of calm when everything else felt chaotic. We celebrate change and adventure, but rarely do we honour the quiet rhythm that keeps us steady. Only when life throws us into chaos do we truly value the comfort of regularity. Routine may sound dull, but sometimes it’s the most beautiful kind of peace.

There’s a story from Amaravathi Kathalu that stayed with me, “Oka Jeevitham Bathikipoyindi” (A life that lived). It’s about a man who lived an utterly ordinary life. He was born, grew up, fulfilled his responsibilities, cared for his children, looked after his parents, helped his siblings settle down, prayed without asking much and one day, quietly passed away. People mourned, but no one thought of him as extraordinary. He was just a simple man, flowing gently like a river.

What made him truly special was his quiet strength. His ability to flow with life instead of fighting against it. He never tried to go upstream or rebel against the current. And that, in truth, requires immense strength. As a Japanese proverb says, “The bamboo that bends is stronger than the oak that resists.” That’s what I’ve been learning, that the stories worth living don’t always have dramatic twists or grand endings. Most of the times, they’re about showing up, holding on, and letting life unfold.

The real peace lies not in predicting what’s next, but in trusting the flow. Like that man from the story or like the river that never questions where it’s going. After all, if we always knew the ending, would we really enjoy getting there?