Lesson 16: Don’t assume.

once attended this rather dry book-keeping course. There was very little information that I actually retained. In fact, the only thing I do remember was the tutor telling us not to assume. What he actually said was this:

Don’t ASSUME, it makes an ASS out of U and ME.

At the time I thought it very clever and certainly far more relevant to everyday life than one would suppose. We can’t assume other people will think like us, behave like us, react like us. We only know about ourselves.  As a libran, this is something that is of especial interest as I have always been able to see the other side’s point of view, to MANY a person’s frustration. When I was reading Law, I had an argument with a friend as I could never give her a definitive answer to a question. It would drive her mad whenever I said, ‘Well, it depends on the situation.’  Having the ability ( is it?!) to see both sides has not always been a blessing. True, many people have said that I have a very strong sense of justice ( a typically libran trait) but I also prevaricate, endlessly change my mad and generally drive everybody – including myself, sometimes- mad in the process.

This ‘ability’- I use the term loosely – don’t panic! to see both sides, unfortunately does not stop me from assuming. I still have trouble remembering that other people don’t react the same way and it causes endlless upsets.

Life is so fraught with double meanings, reading between the lines and guessing what may or may not be meant by a comment, surely time can be better spent?

I wish I knew the answer to actually NOT making an assumption. So often, it is a knee-jerk reaction, so quick to appear that it has bypassed any forms of self-censorship we may have imposed upon ourselves. We all KNOW the theory, not so easy to practice in real life, though…….

A few years ago I went to see a psychic. I had been going through some difficult times and felt I needed some extra guidance. Somebody in my ‘inner-circle’ had been making things very difficult for me and I had spent a fair amount of time complaining about them. I was told that what characteristics I project onto other people are actually the characteristics I have myself. Simply said, the things I was complaining complaining about were actually what I was guilty of! I did not get it, I really couldn’t see it. I was given a few examples of things I said and how they related to me. I was starting to understand but only a bit.  It took me a LONG time to get my head around it. Recently, a friend who is very spritual said the exact same thing to me and it very slowly started clicking.

We can’t assume to know how other people will behave so, if we get upset by the deeds, actions or words, we should give them the benefit of the doubt as maybe they did not mean it the way we may have meant it if we had said it .

If we see fault in others we should just check we are not projecting our own inadequacies on to them and blaming them rather than seeing the fault is coming from us.

This is something I am learning on a daily basis. Someone who says he really cares for me has of late been more and more negative in his view of me. When I question him, I am always met with the response that I put him down.  What I noticed was that the more upset I became over what I considered to be a completely unsubstantiated attack on me, the more I WOULD put him down as a reaction to my hurt.

What did this mean? Was I putting him down and then he reacted to me? Or was he projecting his own fears on to me which resulted in a self-fulfilling prophesy?

I still don’t know the answer. What I certainly do know is that we are not singing from the same hymn-sheet and we are most definitely ought not to be assuming!