Last week’s divorce mediation reinforced for me the importance of asking questions in place of assuming the worst about a person’s actions or even the best. A year earlier, the husband had requested a divorce and for a year the wife had been dragging her feet on filing. He concluded that she was sabotaging the divorce process out of spite while she truly believed her husband was showing signs of ambivalence toward divorcing (even though they had been separated for 18 months and he was currently living with another woman). When asked how his wife might have read ambivalence in him regarding the divorce, the husband responded categorically that he had no doubt they should divorce. He said she was probably picking up on his deep sadness that divorce meant violating his Christian values. If only the wife had asked him to clarify her hopeful impressions instead of assuming the best or the husband had sought to understand his wife’s reluctance to file instead of assuming the worst. They may have saved months of painful confusion and growing hostility. The perils of assumption!
