Traumatic Incident Reduction Association

TIRA eNotes – October 2026 (No. 38)

The Value of Both Predictability and Unpredictability

By Marian Volkman

First let’s talk about what we like about predictability.  We like our car to start, our buses, and trains, and planes to be on time. We like our home to keep standing and we like to be able to regulate its temperature to a reasonable degree.  We like meals to appear on a regular basis (even if we are the ones preparing these meals).  So many things…  We prefer that our friends remain predictably friendly and accepting of us and that our loved ones keep loving us.  You can think of more examples.

What about unpredictability then?  How can we say it has a value when we want predictability in so many areas of life?  Let us think about times when life occurred for us as so predictable as to be dull.  It can happen at school sometimes, at work, and even out in the world.  In fact, we desire and look for a certain amount of unpredictability to keep life spicy and interesting.  Sports!  Who is going to win?  We don’t know and that’s what keeps sports fans engaged.  Any sort of game provides a dose of unpredictably that makes it fun.

Now we have established that there can be too much or too little predictability in various areas of life, what do we do with this knowledge?  And what makes us more or less able to deal successfully with unpredictability that shows up where we didn’t want it?

We all have a general level of unpredictability that is acceptable, even desirable to us.  We can observe that when we are very tired or ill, our tolerance of unpredictable events goes down.  When we feel “on top of the world” we can take on much more uncertainty and continue to thrive.  Events and experiences that have an impact on us affect our tolerance for both predictability and unpredictability, hence our resilience in life.  Raising our tolerance for the unexpected can enhance our quality of life.

Human beings tend to push away painful or overwhelming memories.  We don’t want to go back into that darkness and confusion.  Traumatic Incident Reduction, and related Applied Metapsychology techniques, designed to be both person-centered and highly structured, give us a time and place to “unpack” memories of times we were confused, upset or overwhelmed.  Practitioners learn and practice the skills needed to hold a very stable, familiar and predictable space for a session to take place.  The predictability of the elements of a session and the steady predictability of the practitioner empowers clients to do achieve real results in each session. The client chooses what they want to work on and aided by their trained practitioner, works through it until a satisfying end point is reached.  Of course, the client determines the end point, not the practitioner.

As we make use of this safe, predictable method to systematically address times that were painful for us (and that could be triggered in the present), we reduce pain and confusion from the past.  We get back the energy and attention that were tie up in that past event.  There are fewer things that are trigger-able. As a result, the present starts to look brighter, and we find ourselves more able to take whatever unpredictability life throws at us in stride.

To benefit from Applied Metapsychology, see:

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