What are assumptions that are worth making? Here are 7.
You know what they say about assumptions, right?
Assumptions make a butt out of you and me.
So, we are told to try to avoid assumptions, so we aren’t a butt. But not all assumptions are created equal. Some assumptions can be helpful. Here are seven assumptions that are good for you and you should start using immediately.
What are assumptions that are worth making?
Assume there is someone on the elevator waiting to get off before you get on.
The number of times I almost get plowed over because the person waiting to get on the elevator doesn’t pause to see if someone is getting off is frightening. It’s a 50/50 proposition that someone is waiting. You can wait five seconds until the door fully opens to see if someone needs to get out. Waiting five seconds will save a potential collision and embarrassment, but waiting five seconds will not save you from being noticeably late. Assuming this will make you appear more courteous.
Assume positive intent.
Most people aren’t evil or out to get you personally. When others negatively impact you, it’s more likely the other person lacks awareness of self or others, is lacking knowledge, or might be experiencing something outside of their interaction with you that is causing them to hurt your feelings. The interaction might even unintentionally cause you inconvenience/discomfort. I wrote a whole article (here) on the subject of assuming positive intent. Assuming positive intent is suitable for you and the other person.
Assume you aren’t that smart and that other people aren’t that dumb.
If you assume you are smarter than everyone else, you will look down on everyone and be a jerk. Plus assuming you are smarter than everyone prevents curiosity. A lack of curiosity prevents learning. Learning is required for new ideas, and new ideas are needed for growth and different outcomes. So if you assume you are the smartest one you will stop learning and growing. If you stop learning and growing, you are stagnant. Stagnant people aren’t the smartest people in any room.
Assume good things will happen instead of bad.
Start from a place of appreciation for what you have today. Then, when faced with a situation where one outcome is positive and the other is negative, assume the positive one will happen. It won’t always happen, but assuming a good result will limit unnecessary worry and, over time, will retrain your brain to see the good in the world instead of the bad. Science shows that people with positive outlooks live better lives even if they don't always get better outcomes.
Assume a system/process is perfectly designed to get the results it’s currently getting.
This is opposed to believing the system that doesn’t get the results you want it to is broken. Its not your job to fix systems you believe are broken its your job to solve problems. Too often, we try to get different results by slightly adjusting what currently exists. We think something is broken with the current system, and the results it’s getting are wrong. This leads us to believe that all we need to do is adjust the current system, and we will get different results. Any system that produces an output is working.
“Any system that produces something is a working system.”
Instead of adjusting the current system to try to get it to deliver different results, design a new system (or product or process) from scratch.
Start by defining the problem you are trying to solve and what success looks like.
Next, design a system to solve the problem and and achieve your defined version of success.
Once the system is designed, consider if pieces of the existing system will help jump-start building your new system.
You will get wildly different solutions and results when using this approach. You might get a slower start, but you will end up getting further faster and with less rework.
Assume you can do it now or can learn to do it in the future, not that you can’t do it (period).
You are more capable than you give yourself credit for today, and you can learn to become even more capable in the future. This mindset will help you start working towards the future instead of finding reasons to procrastinate and not get started. Comparison is the key reason why you think you can’t. Stop comparing yourself to others. Compare today’s version of you to who you were in the past and set a course for who you want to become in the future.
Assume others need help, and you can be helpful to them.
We tend to assume everyone else has their life together, and we are the only ones who don’t. This leads us to avoid asking for help so we don’t give others evidence that we aren’t as altogether as we perceive them to be. We also avoid offering to help others because we assume no one needs help or at least not the help we can offer. Helping others is good for everyone involved. It creates a sense of community of shared success that is missing from the world today.
Offer to help others to use your gifts for good and admit you need help so others can use their gifts for good. That would be a lot of mutual good being shared.
Conclusion
You can assume if you make these changes, you will have a much better life ahead of you.
DON’T FORGET TO CHECK OUT THE DOING LIFE TOGETHER PODCAST.
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