Big Assumptions

Last weekend I attended a family wedding. This happy gathering of friends and family brought people of all ages together to celebrate a commitment to relationship. Watching the guests interact I found myself thinking of Don Miguel Ruiz’s classic book of Toltec wisdom The Four Agreements.

His suggestion to Make No Assumptions is a powerful teaching.

It covers so much more than the common sense management of our own affairs based on conscious choices. He is pointing too at the cultural structures in which we live and the unexamined decisions we make which spring from a prevailing social climate. Too often we act with a herd mentality, blindly following this unacknowledged cultural bias. This leads us to activity and conclusions which drown out authentic interactions and the soul’s song with it.

These false assumptions are obvious at a big gathering, but they are constant in our every-day lives too, colouring our choices in ways which are reductive and stultifying. For example, is the future something to be feared? Can a product such as insurance buy you peace of mind? What does society mean by the word “Safe”?

Is it only safe to live when every possible risk and contingency is covered? Is that living?

When guests gathered for dinner I found myself next to a lovely person. C spoke of her adult children with great affection. She described her experience of flying with her newly licensed son, piloting a tiny plane. Her courage was in recognising that demonstrating trust in her son and his ability outweighed her very real fear of the risks of flying. Her intuitive perception of the real value in the situation sounded her soul note clear and strong.

In different circumstances her intuition might have advised her differently. It is a moment by moment procedure this. It is not a choice made on blanket assumptions such as “Sixty year old woman ought not risk their lives in small planes. It is not ..(insert judgement or duty- such as safe, dignified, responsible, in fact whatever restraint society deems might apply)”

There are many such defining moments in every average day. It is, however, only possible to perceive those moments when we are present, living as if it was our last day, with an attitude that every moment counts. Then we are there – present- to intuitively recognise the opportunity for the soul’s note to sound.

This approach seems like a tall order as compared to the way we are raised, but with willingness and heart engagement it comes naturally.

This is living as opposed to existing in a bubble of assumptions.