Speculations and Assumptions

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I have a friend who tends to avoid hearing about things one speculates and assumes on any subject matter but I want them to understand the making speculations on events and situations along with making assumptions as a result is normal and an intricate part of being human. 

Speculation an essential tool in assessing risk. The opposite to speculation is assumption. When we speculate we are working in our minds the what, when, where, how and of course the why of the event or situation so we may file it away for future reference just in case we become involved is said event or situation or some event or situation similar to the one we speculated about and made assumptions on. 

To assess anything provides us instinctual and insightful information from knowledge, experience and training so that we can also make decisions toward appropriate actions especially as it would apply to conflict and violence. Even if we train things, those things in all likelihood will not be in the same form when encountered in other situations especially in real life situations regarding almost anything but in conflicts and with violence especially. 

This is critical especially when encountering the unknown in sometimes unexpected situations we have not experienced making reality-based adrenal stress-conditioned training a critical component of self-defense as well for the physical model used for that defense. In short, we need speculations and assumptions to learn and therefore survive, it is the way of human-kind. At least to my perceptions, theories, understanding and belief - at least until someone provides proof of something better and more correct. 

It is how I see things when the traffic slows to a crawl when passing by an accident, the are all eyeballing the situation, speculation as to how it was caused and why then they are speculation the condition of those involved as to injuries or even death. They are running a variety possible scenarios in their head as to what happened, how it happened and why it happened. All assumptions based on possibly nothing or based on past experience in an accident or based on information and understandings from life experiences to include media driven reports on such events. They they speculate as to how they could have avoided that same situation and that is based on assumptions that seemingly come from nowhere or from experience and knowledge based on whether they completed a defensive driving program, etc. 

No one can remove that instinctual urge to speculate about events that occur around us especially when they involve danger, possible danger and possible to actual threats that would violate our personal safety and health. The same applies to making assumptions to those speculative ideas and theories used to act accordingly. 

I suggest that when one decides that speculation and assumptions are negative and not necessary and who try to avoid using speculation and assumption are actually avoiding the subject of that speculation and assumptions because it makes them feel uncomfortable, fearful and out of control. It is not actually the use of speculation to make assumptions but a fear of not being in control and not knowing because they have to have the answers or they don’t feel in control and therefore experience fear and so on. 

To achieve a greater or the greatest odds of hitting the nail on the head when using speculation and when making assumptions you need to seek out knowledge, understand that knowledge and how it applies to life, i.e., events and situations in life, and that helps our brains to seek out, manipulate and make use of the knowledge base we encode in our mind through such effort to learn, accumulate knowledge, gain experience both real and academic and finally to apply that when we speculate and assume in any given situation and about any given event within the situation and at any given moment. 

Education, understanding and experience are the most critical aspects of life necessary for speculation and the art of making assumptions especially for self-defense against conflict and violence. The three are core to acquiring data necessary to make speculation and assumptions work as the essential tool in assessing risk and when you assess risk you provide the way toward avoidance, etc. 

Trying to avoid the use of such critical survival tools is tantamount to losing your sight and going deaf. Would you want to deal with violence in that state? Another very important point on this subject, it is also critical once you speculate and assume an answer, response or fix you must validate it and verify its relevance, etc. 

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