‘It is what it is’. Four ordinary words that can bring a difficult conversation to an abrupt end. Sometimes they express genuine acceptance. Sometimes they are what people say when they are exhausted by explanations, disappointed by circumstances or simply unable to imagine anything changing.
The phrase can be comforting because it asks nothing more of someone who has already endured enough. Yet it can also carry a troubling sense of finality, as though recognising what has happened means accepting that nothing meaningful remains within reach.
Author and healthcare leader Chrissla Anne Davis challenges that finality through the title of her book, It Is What It Is – But What Comes Next Is Mine. Its second half introduces a possibility worth exploring: even when circumstances are beyond our control, the future may still contain decisions that belong to us.
Life rarely offers the neat beginnings and endings found in motivational stories. People can experience profound disruption without receiving an explanation, an apology or an opportunity to return to what they had before.
When Acceptance Starts to Resemble Resignation
There is a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from arguing with a reality that refuses to change. A relationship has ended, a professional opportunity has disappeared or an unexpected development has disrupted plans that once seemed dependable. Eventually, continuing to question why something happened may become more painful than acknowledging that it did.
Acceptance can bring relief from that struggle. It allows someone to recognise the circumstances in front of them without spending every moment wishing those circumstances were different.
But acceptance becomes complicated when it begins to shape expectations about everything that follows. Someone who has experienced disappointment may become reluctant to trust another opportunity. A person whose plans have collapsed may stop making new ones, not because they have lost every ambition but because hoping again feels expensive.
Resignation can protect people from further disappointment in the short term. Over time, however, it may also persuade them that decisions they once considered possible are no longer worth attempting.
