In a bygone time, there was certainty regarding your career, your job stability, and plans for the future. If an individual worked hard and was a good employee, there was a good chance they could be there for life.

There were certain things that could be assumed. Those assumptions were the underpinning of your life. An employee could reasonably expect that income would steadily increase each year, the stock market would provide a steady rate of return, which would offer opportunities for home ownership, college education for your children, annual vacations, and, eventually, a comfortable retirement.

Those assumptions seem to be relics of the 20th century.

Now, most employees work 10-12 hour days and are married to their job. Wild swings in economic fortunes continue to trouble us all, and there is no certainty for our futures.

The economic angst is just one of the uncertainties faced by characters in my new novel, The Illusion of Certainty.

I tried to show the human impact of the nationwide economic downturn and how someone’s life can suddenly go into a downward spiral once uncertainty is introduced.

In The Illusion of Certainty, the characters are coping with losses that largely reflect those of Americans today, dealing with shifting social values, issues of the modern family, the flailing economy, unemployment, and the shattering of our illusions of certainty.

Although the characters go through many hard times, ultimately, they learn an important lesson about moving on and rebuilding after loss. It is possible.

One of the main characters in the book, Marc, loses his illusions of certainty twice: the first time when he discovers his wife’s infidelity, destroying his illusions of certainty about his marriage and family. The second time occurs when his job is “excessed” after the subprime mortgage crisis, treating his entire team as excess spending rather than people.

When Marc meets with his former team member, Samantha, he realizes she has suffered greatly herself. Samantha finally found a job only to be informed the next day that her husband has been excessed, leaving them with one job once again. She offers Marc an important message about moving on. Samantha urges Marc to “snap out of it” and rebuild his life. “You’ve been beat down, Marc. You’ve lost your wife and lost your job. That sucks. Your wife is a lying skank and you worked for a heartless corporation. But, Marc, it’s time to get up off the mat!”

Samantha reminds Marc that we can “take action or be acted upon.” She encourages him to take a trip that has the potential to change his outlook on life, to “do a reboot,” and then “come back and kick some butt… Right now, you have a big problem. It’s time to fix yourself! Use all of the talents you have and remake yourself.”

Many Americans have become disheartened by the economic situation and fall into cycles of self-fulfilling prophecies of failure, too discouraged to do something bold or be proactive in securing a new career. Just as Marc changed his life with some encouragement, readers will find that they, too, can enact the change that they desire in their own lives through encouragement.

There are no promises that it will be easy. We’ll have to adapt, change, and reinvent ourselves several times over the course of a career.

The key theme in my book is that “the only certainty in life is uncertainty.”