He was there again. Damn. I had gone to the pool nine times in the past month, and every time, the same guy was swimming in my favorite lane.
One time, I tried to get him to move over so I could share with him. I sat on the edge, dangled my legs in and waited for him to stop. He didn’t. He just kept swimming, as if I wasn’t even there.
Entitled asshole, I thought, who does he think he is?
I sat down at the edge of the next lane — the inferior lane with the sloped pool floor— and stuffed my hair into my swim cap.
Then it happened. The lifeguard walked over, dipped a foot-long stick in the man’s lane, and the man got out. The lifeguard handed the man the stick, which he unfurled into a full-sized cane.
Placing the cane in front of him, the man scraped the pool deck in a 180-degree semicircle, as the lifeguard took his elbow and guided him to the locker room.
That’s when I saw the sign. It was set back three or four feet from the end of the lane, so I didn’t notice it before. It read: Blind Swimmer.
The thing is I’m a nice person. I engage in light banter with the garbage collectors who take my trash. I yield to cars when they want to get into my lane. I donate blood and give to public radio.
Yet when faced with a swimmer who was doing nothing but enjoying his workout, I automatically assumed an ill-intentioned scenario when none existed.
That’s not the worst part. The worst part is that I’ve done the same thing with the people closest to me.
The Horrible Power of Assumption
My ex-husband was a huge sports fan. It wasn’t uncommon for him to come home from work and plop down on the couch for two hours to watch “the game.” There was always some sort of game on.
I could have seen this habit as him unwinding after a long day, enjoying some much-needed “me time.” I could have seen it as his brand of self-care — that’s certainly how he would have viewed me doing the same thing. But I didn’t.
I never plopped on the couch to watch TV because there was too much to do. Groceries to be bought, dinner to be made, dishes to be washed, the kids’ homework to be supervised. I’d drag home six bags of groceries, see him lying on the couch and immediately resent him.
Who does he think he is? How come he gets to lie there doing nothing while I’m loaded down with chores? I hate him.
Sometimes I’d verbalize those thoughts. Other times, I’d try to keep them to myself, the resentment building, as I watched him relax while I busied myself with a myriad of tasks that never seemed to end.
Then we’d fight, and I’d say horrible things to him, accuse him of being lazy, of not caring about me or the kids, of not working hard enough. I was a real peach.
Our chore wars didn’t cause the divorce, but they didn’t help the situation.
Sometimes I’d verbalize those thoughts. Other times, I’d try to keep them to myself, the resentment building, as I watched him relax while I busied myself with a myriad of tasks that never seemed to end.
What If Everyone Really Is Doing Their Best?
Years later, I’d go to counseling and read self-help books and listen to talks by relationship experts. I’d go on many dates with many different kinds of men. I’d navigate the tricky world of being a single mom in the suburbs.
Eventually, I would learn that most people go through life in their own heads. They don’t intend to harm or irritate us. They are simply going about their business, living their own lives in their own heads, not knowing how their behavior affects us. And sometimes not seeing us at all.
That was the beginning of the shift for me. I began to approach my relationships with the idea that everyone has good intentions. And not just when they are behaving in ways I like, but all the time.
What if, I wondered, the behavior I found so irritating was just someone with different priorities than I? What if the behavior I interpreted as a snub was merely someone not paying attention? What if the actions I viewed as ill-willed were merely a different approach to tackling a task?
Three Life-Changing Words
My mantra became simply: Assume the best.
It was both a basic and a revolutionary thought, profoundly terrifying and liberating at the same time.
That was six years ago. I still live by that mantra. And it has transformed my relationships.
That was the beginning of the shift for me. I began to approach my relationships with the idea that everyone has good intentions. And not just when they are behaving in ways I like, but all the time.
When a neighbor brags about how superior her daughter’s new private school is to the local public high school — a school my daughter attends and finds challenging — I assume she has a good reason for saying that.
When my 17-year-old gives me one word answers, then disappears into her room after I ask how her day was, I assume she has a good reason for being curt.
When I ask my boyfriend to go car shopping with me, and he tells me I don’t need a new car, I wait a beat. I breathe. Then I assume the best.
That doesn’t mean I’m a doormat. I don’t walk around with a Pollyanna smile on my face and make excuses when people behave badly.
It simply means that my hurt or disappointment or sadness or anxiety is not papered over with blame or anger directed at other people.
I’m able to deal directly with my uncomfortable feelings because I don’t focus on other people’s actions — who was right, who was justified, who deserved it. I simply focus on my own actions and reactions and what I can do to make things better.
Maybe They Do Have a Good Reason…
When I’m able to manage this approach to life, I learn things I never would have learned otherwise, and my relationships are far more satisfying because of it.
In my neighbor’s case, I later learned that her daughter was being bullied at the public school. The girl suffered from anxiety and depression, but now she’s thriving at the private school.
My 17-year-old had just come home from work on the day she was curt with me, and she was heading to her room where three hours of homework awaited her. It was 9 p.m. She didn’t have time to discuss her day with me.
When my boyfriend made the dismissive comment about my lack of need for a new car, the hair on my feminist neck stood on end. But I took a moment. I calmed down. Then I asked, “What makes you say that?”
It turns out he wants to get married, and he had calculated how much we would need to buy a house. He had constructed a spreadsheet of our current and future expenses and concluded that if we wanted to buy our dream home in the next two years, we would need to wait at least that long to replace our cars.
He never volunteered that information. I later learned that it was because he didn’t think he had to.
Months later, I told him about my initial reaction to his car comment. He said, “Really? I just assumed you knew I’d have a good reason for saying that.”
I nodded and said, “I do.”
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Previously published on medium
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