What You Don’t Understand May Change Everything

One of the books that has stayed with me for more than twenty years is Don Miguel Ruiz’s The Four Agreements. One of those agreements is beautifully simple: Don’t make assumptions.

I understood the words when I first read them. But I am not sure I truly understood their depth.

Because one of the things I keep learning about life is how quickly we decide we understand what is happening. And how often we are wrong.

During our recent trip to Mallorca, the air conditioning in our hotel room wasn’t working properly. Someone was sent up to help.

He spoke very little English. I spoke no Spanish. We tried to communicate. We pointed at the thermostat. We eventually pulled out Google Translate. He took a picture of the controls. I became increasingly frustrated.

I remember thinking, What kind of maintenance person doesn’t know how to fix the air conditioning?

Later, I went up to the rooftop pool.

And there he was. Standing behind the bar.

He wasn’t a maintenance person at all.

Suddenly everything made sense.

The problem hadn’t been his incompetence.

The problem was my assumption.

I had been reacting to a story that I had created from incomplete information.

That small moment stayed with me. Because I think we do this far more often than we realize.

The Mind Does Not Like Missing Pieces

When something doesn’t make sense, the mind wants an explanation.

Someone becomes distant. Our partner reacts unexpectedly. A friend stops calling. Someone says or does something we simply cannot understand.

We rarely leave the space blank and say:

I don’t understand this yet.

Instead, the mind fills in the missing pieces.

They don’t care. They’re selfish. They’re angry with me. They should know better.

And very quickly, an interpretation begins to feel like reality.

Once we believe that story, we start responding to it rather than to the person or situation itself. Our energy changes. Our choices change. Sometimes the relationship changes.

Not because of what actually happened, but because of what we decided it meant.

Understanding Changes the Energy

I saw another simple example of this during a recent coaching session.

The person I was coaching was walking around outside while we talked. For a while, part of me wondered why he wouldn’t simply sit down.

Eventually I asked.

The bench was wet.

That was it.

The moment I understood, my concern disappeared.

Nothing outside me had changed. What changed was my understanding.

We often believe the situation has to change before we can feel differently.

Sometimes what changes first is our perception.

And when that happens, the emotional charge can shift almost instantly.

Seek First to Understand

There is an old idea that says we should seek first to understand before trying to be understood.

The older I get, the more wisdom I see in that.

Understanding does not mean agreeing, excusing harmful behaviour or abandoning boundaries.

It simply means being willing to admit that there may be something we do not yet know.

That sounds simple. It isn’t.

Our minds love certainty. Certainty feels safe.

It allows us to quickly decide who is right, who is wrong, who is responsible and what should happen next.

But consciousness asks something different of us.

It asks us to remain open a little longer.

It asks: What might I not be seeing?

The Request Beneath the Request

The coaching session that sparked this reflection involved an employee asking for a very large raise.

On the surface, the issue seemed obvious.

She wanted more money.

The logical response was equally obvious:

What additional responsibility will you take on?

What additional value will you create?

What justifies the increase?

Those are reasonable questions.

But as we talked, another question began emerging.

Why does she want the money?

She wanted more time. She wanted less stress. Perhaps she wanted a different life.

Suddenly the conversation was no longer simply about compensation.

There was something underneath the request.

And until that was understood, negotiating numbers might solve the wrong problem.

I began thinking about how often this happens.

Someone says, “I need more money.”

Maybe what they really want is security.

Someone says, “I need you to change.”

Maybe what they really want is to feel seen.

Someone says, “I don’t care.”

Maybe caring has become painful.

The words we hear are not always the whole message.

Sometimes there is a request beneath the request.

A fear beneath the anger.

A wound beneath the defensiveness.

A longing beneath the complaint.

And we may never discover it if we rush immediately to judgment.

We Want to Shortcut the Understanding

At one point during that coaching conversation, I heard myself say something that has stayed with me:

We want to shortcut the understanding process.

I think we do.

We want the answer.

We want the explanation.

We want to know what something means so we can decide what to do.

But perhaps part of being human is learning how to live for a while inside the question.

I don’t know why they did that.

I don’t know what I am missing.

I don’t even fully understand my own reaction yet.

There is humility in that.

And strangely, there is freedom in it too.

Because the moment we admit that we don’t know, we stop defending the story we invented.

Now something new can enter.

Information. Perspective. Conversation. Insight. Truth.

Curiosity Creates Space

One of the greatest changes in my own life has been learning to become more curious about my reactions.

I still get irritated.

I still make assumptions.

I still decide too quickly that something should be different than it is.

But increasingly, another voice appears.

Jeffrey, what don’t you understand yet?

That question can change the entire experience.

It shifts me from reaction into observation.

From judgment into curiosity.

From certainty into possibility.

And I think this matters far beyond our individual lives.

We are living in a world where people are increasingly being encouraged to react before understanding.

We see a headline, a short video, a social media post, a comment or a fragment of a conversation.

And almost instantly we are invited to form an opinion.

But fragments rarely contain the whole truth.

Neither do our first impressions.

Neither do our assumptions.

Perhaps one of the most conscious things we can do right now is become a little slower to decide that we understand.

What If There Is More to Know?

The man who came to our hotel room was not an incompetent maintenance worker.

He was a bartender trying to help.

The man pacing during my coaching session wasn’t restless.

The bench was wet.

An employee asking for more money may not only be asking for more money.

A person who seems difficult may be carrying something we cannot see.

And the person we think we understand least may make far more sense if we knew the pieces of their story that are currently invisible to us.

This does not mean we will always understand one another.

We won’t.

But perhaps wisdom begins with becoming less certain that the first explanation our mind gives us is the truth.

Sometimes one missing piece changes the whole picture.

And sometimes the question that opens the door is simply:

What don’t I understand yet?

Activate the Wisdom

The next time you feel yourself reacting strongly to someone or something, notice the story your mind is telling you.

Then ask yourself:

What do I actually know?

What am I assuming?

What might I not understand yet?

You do not have to excuse anyone.

You do not have to change your boundaries.

You do not even have to change your decision.

Just become curious enough to make room for another possibility.

Because sometimes understanding does not merely change how you see the situation.

It changes the situation you thought you were seeing.

September 29, 2026