Don't Make Assumptions

The Third Agreement

Photo by Marek Piwnicki on Unsplash

Of the four agreements, I find this one the hardest to keep. We are all adept at pattern recognition, it’s part of our humanness. All day, everyday, our brains and other parts of our bodies make order of the world around us; we process chaos. Sometimes we know the answers to things before we know, that we know. Sometimes we think we know, but we’re wrong. 

We do nothing perfectly, including pattern recognition. We can only do it successfully up to a point. There is a line at which we should stop and start asking questions. We normally blow right past this line during our sprint to a conclusion. We all have different reasons for not honoring this threshold; for some of us it is ego, for others it’s fear, and for many of us it’s habit. 

Not understanding where our lines are and failing to honor these limits of human cognition we curse our interactions with one another. Big deal interactions, like politics and religion, and small interactions about chores and punctuality, are all susceptible to the blight of assumption. 

Caveat: If you’ve ever made decisions in mere moments that ended up literally saving your life, those aren’t assumptions. That’s survival mode pattern recognition, it’s autopilot. I’m not talking about that.

The Third Law: Don’t Make Assumptions

I’m a very observant person. If you go back and read my article about superpowers you’ll get a sense for what I mean. I feel like a good way to think about this is that I’m aware of the patterns my brain builds to process information. It’s a lot like the relationship between Tony Stark and Jarvis, for those of you not familiar with that reference, it’s like having a really powerful machine processor as a companion. 

This means I’m aware of some of the inputs my brain is using to build patterns. These are like freeze frames that I can pause to study and learn more about a given situation. A huff, an eye roll, voice intonation, facial expression, I’m aware of bits and pieces of all of these parts. That awareness can be dangerous because awareness isn’t knowing. But, when you’re right about something 40% of the time, it feels like you’re never wrong. So you forget the danger of jumping to a conclusion, even if it might be a tiny step. 

But, questions are scary. Sometimes we don’t really want to know the answers, we just want to feel like we do. That way we never actually have to face a conclusion that may be hard for us to accept, a conclusion that may hurt our feelings. So we feign this pursuit of the truth but we doddle at the door. It’s hard and it's scary, but we have to ask the questions, because it’s liberating. 

When you’re wrestling with an assumption, you are in a debate with yourself, and that debate takes up energy and processing power. How many dramatic debates, or misunderstandings could you have avoided if you instead asked the question on the tip of your tongue? 

Instead of asking, we wrestle with ourselves about why we shouldn’t. It’s a soft struggle, and sometimes we get comfortable in that struggle, we think we’d rather wrestle than rest. Are you wrestling with yourself, when you could just ask a question? Ask the question, it will set you free.

If you aren’t asking the question, then you’re making an assumption. When multiple people aren’t asking questions, then multiple assumptions are being made, and that’s a recipe for disaster. Assumptions get us anywhere from cold shoulders to fist fights. All because no one asked a question.

Ask the question

Times I Made Assumptions

When we first relocated from Washington, DC, to Atlanta, GA, we were a one car family and I rode my bike to work. We were fortunate enough to find a place to live that was very close to my office. Our daughter was 4 weeks old when we made the move, yes, we relocated with an infant. 

I didn’t always feel like biking home after work so sometimes I’d call my wife and ask her to come and pick me up. When she arrived I just grabbed my bike and threw it in the trunk. One day as I was sitting in front my office building, waiting for my ride home, a coworker I didn’t know gave me an odd look. A look that made me wonder, ‘What was that about?’. But you know what, I didn’t ask the question. I made an assumption about what that look entailed. 

Five to ten minutes later, my spidey senses are going off. Everything slowed down, I started looking around all over, I was getting panicked so I stood up. When I did, I saw a half moon formation of police officers slowly closing in on my position. I raised my hands and tried saying I work here, but the words probably came out like gibberish. They kept advancing.

Probably seconds later, the officer at the center of the half moon formation recognizes me. He worked security at this building and he’d seen me coming day in and day out. They all stop walking towards me.

He yells, “One of your coworkers called the cops on you.” My coworker also made an assumption. Two tiny assumptions gave me a lot of stress and may have cost me a lot more.

Ask the question

In July, it can feel really hot outside in Atlanta so it’s nice to go running at sunset. I love running. Anyway, one evening I’m heading out for a run. I leave my house and turn right at an intersection and to my left I see a police officer driving towards me. I cross the street and continue running.

It’s a residential neighborhood and the speed limit is 25 mph. I ran in high school and college and I’m still in fairly good shape, but there’s no way I’m running 25 mph. Why hasn’t this police officer’s vehicle passed me yet? 

I turn to my right and the police officer is driving at my running pace and we’re the only ones on the road. So, I slowed down, they matched my speed. I stopped and they stopped. Now, I’m just looking at the officer’s vehicle and I say, “Hey.” The officer responds, “Hey.” Then there are more stares. I turned around and ran home.

It was all of 7 minutes long. I never asked the question, “How are you doing?” When I think back on this moment, I realize I missed an opportunity. I just don’t know what opportunity I missed. I sensed the call to converse, but I was scared. Because I didn’t ask the question, I’ll never know.

Ask the question.

I make lots of other smaller assumptions all day everyday, but for me, these two examples remind me to ask questions.

If you’re in a situation and there is a question you feel inclined to ask then please ask it.