My first Friday night managing a new pizza store was a mess.
We sold almost 700 pizzas, customers packed the waiting area, employees were frazzled, orders were wrong, and some people left without their food. I had been certain I could handle it.
Certain.
Before I left that night, I decided what needed to change. The company script told every caller, “Your order will be ready in ten minutes.” One pizza waiting? Ten minutes. Twenty pizzas waiting? Ten minutes. Apparently, the clock was expected to become more efficient when we got busy.
The next Friday, we changed the promise. We added ten minutes to the number of pizzas waiting to be made. Five pizzas meant fifteen minutes. That was the decision.
We sold 802 pizzas. No remakes. No incorrect orders. No customers leaving without food.
Was I 100% certain the change would work? No. I wasn’t even 99.99% certain about the outcome. Outcomes involve customers, employees, ovens, traffic, weather, and all the other things that refuse to ask my permission.
But I could be nearly certain about the decision.
That kind of certainty does not come from knowing the future. It comes from being honest about the present. What are the facts? What am I pretending not to see? What result am I actually trying to create? Does this choice move in that direction? Am I willing to accept responsibility if it does not work?
Most of us say we need more clarity when what we really want is protection. Protection from regret. Protection from criticism. Protection from discovering that we were wrong.
No decision can provide that.
A question mark keeps asking the future for a guarantee. An exclamation point says, “I have listened. I have questioned. I know enough to act.”
And then it remains willing to be nudged.
Shift/Insight
Certainty is not confidence that everything will work. It is confidence that the decision is honest, intentional, aligned with the destination, and open to correction.
Today’s Nudge
Write down one decision you are delaying. Beneath it, answer: “What fact am I still missing, and what fact am I avoiding?”
Faith Connection
Jesus did not give His followers a complete forecast.
He said, “Follow me.” Faith does not erase the unknown.
It decides whether the unknown belongs to God, or whether I will keep pretending it belongs to me.