Assumptions Bite

Remember the old joke: When you assume, you make an ass out of u and me? Maybe there's a good reason this word starts with the three letters it does, because when we make an assumption, that's usually where the result bites us. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

I recently wrote about the importance of having enough information. Apparently, I'm still getting this one down because it seems to be a theme running through my life, directly and indirectly. Over the last week, there were several things I initiated that didn't have the outcome I thought they might. In fact, I had no response. Silence. But I was having fun with this; so every time I wondered what was going on, I'd say, "Not enough information." Sure enough, by the end of the week, I learned what was actually happening. A great deal of time and energy could have been wasted had I told myself a story that had nothing to do with the truth. Instead of twisting myself in knots, I stayed serene.

This came home to me during a recent conversation with someone who did not have enough information. There was no room in her "in-box" for facts because it was full of assumptions. Before I could speak up to address this, she told both of us a story as though it were fact, from the present moment all the way up to anticipating dying alone in agony. It was really amazing. So was trying to get her back to reality.

If you want information, ask. Just be sure you ask the right person. If you need to know why person A is doing something, you don't ask person B what they think person A is doing. You ask person A. The woman I was conversing with was talking to everyone but the person she needed to talk to. If you think about it, it's a form of mob mentality, just on a smaller scale.

Hans Hofmann said, "The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak." Assumptions are unnecessary, and they do complicate rather than simplify. Assumptions are like glue, they hold you in one spot.

Nearly everyone has a tendency to make an assumption from time to time. It happens. It's not important that we eliminate doing so (probably impossible), what's important is what we do once we see ourselves heading down that path. Which would you rather: Encourage your imagination to clutter your mental and emotional space, or delete the unnecessary so the necessary becomes obvious?

There are many ways we humans self-induce stress (and suffer some pretty negative results). Recognition of what needs to be deleted from our assumption in-box and doing so is a good first step to creating a calmer experience of daily life. This frees us to direct our creativity and energy productively. It also creates fewer wrinkles.