The Skill of Not Knowing
More Mind in the Story, Essay #1 - Chris Grimes, LCSW-S
“Not knowing isn’t the absence of skill. It’s the skill.”
A moment from the room
A sixteen-year-old I’ll call Nora drops onto the couch and announces that she quit the swim team. Three years of 5 a.m. practices, ended with a text to her coach. Her parents are furious. She shrugs: “I just didn’t want to anymore.”
I can feel my mind start writing the explanation. Burnout. Perfectionism. Maybe something with the coach. I have a tidy hypothesis ready before she finishes her sentence, and I can feel how satisfying it would be to say it out loud.
Instead I say, “I don’t think I understand it yet. Help me out — what was that morning like, when you sent the text?”
She looks at me for a second, a little surprised. Then: “Honestly? I was relieved. And then I felt sick about being relieved.”
That wasn’t the story I had written for her. It was better, because it was hers.
The idea
In mentalization-based treatment, we call this the not-knowing stance. It starts from a simple, humbling fact: minds are opaque. I can’t see directly into Nora’s mind, and much of the time she can’t fully see into her own. What I can do is stay genuinely interested in what’s going on in there, and invite her to get interested too.
Not knowing is not passive, and it isn’t vague. It’s active work: noticing, asking, checking my guesses, and being willing to be corrected. I don’t throw away what I know. I hold it lightly, as a hypothesis rather than a verdict. That takes practice, the way any discipline does.
Here is what I’ve come to believe about why it matters. When I’m certain, there’s really only room for one mind in the room — mine. When I’m curious, there’s room for the client to find her own. Embracing uncertainty also frees me. I no longer need a script for how a good therapist sounds, so I can respond to the actual person in front of me.
Clients feel the difference. Being met with real interest, not a diagnosis dressed up as a question, is often where trust begins: the sense that what someone else says about you might be worth taking in. And that trust doesn’t stay in my office. It goes home, to school, into friendships, where clients start wondering about minds instead of assuming.
Why it’s hard
Almost everything about our training pulls the other way. We were taught to assess, formulate and intervene. Families come in wanting answers, and often they’re paying for them. A confident explanation feels like competence; a question can feel like stalling.
Then there’s the pause. When a client says something painful or puzzling, the silence afterward can be uncomfortable for both of us. Advice ends the silence. So does being right. Both give me relief, which is exactly why I need to be suspicious of them.
Stress makes it harder still. When feelings run high in the room, theirs or mine, all of us slide toward fast, certain thinking. That’s simply how minds work under pressure. It’s why curiosity has to be practiced when things are calm, so it’s there when they aren’t.
One more trap: not knowing can be faked. “And what do you think that means?” asked in a flat, practiced voice is just another script. Real curiosity has warmth in it. The client can tell I actually want to know.
Try this
Three lines you could use tomorrow:
“I’m not sure I’ve got that right. Can you help me understand?”
“I had a guess, but I’d rather hear what it was like for you.”
“Hang on, I think I just got ahead of you. Can we go back a step?”
The words matter less than the intention behind them: you’re handing the authority on their experience back to the person who lives it.
For parents
When your teenager says something that baffles or worries you, the pull is to fix it, explain it or lecture. Try leading with one honest question instead: “That surprised me. What was going on for you?” You don’t have to agree with the answer, and you can still hold your limits. But curiosity tells your kid that their mind is worth knowing, and that is often what makes them willing to hear yours.
The examples in this series are composites drawn from many clinical experiences; no real client is described.
This blog is for education only. It isn’t therapy and isn’t a substitute for care from a licensed professional.