Questioning your assumptions

As a research scientist one of the most important skills you need to learn is to question your assumptions.  The explicit assumptions, i.e. the ones you've chosen to adopt, are easy, since they form the framework of the study or experiment you're doing and you state them upfront.  The trickier ones are the implicit assumptions, the ones you've made without even realising.  Sometimes these implicit assumptions are so deeply buried that you don't even know they're there.  Those are the dangerous ones, the ones that lead you to erroneous conclusions and can misdirect your work for days, months or even years.  There's a horrible moment when you realise that your own inability to see the obvious has led you down a blind alley.  There's an almost overwhelming urge to pretend it hasn't happened, not let on, carry on regardless.  You know in your heart that you have to stop what you are doing and start again from scratch, but it's hard to let go of months or years of work, to acknowledge that it was all a waste of time.  Well, maybe not a complete waste - you have at least learnt not to make that mistake again, and to examine your motives and assumptions a little harder next time.

I recently had my hair cut short.  The last time I had my hair this short I was 4 years old, just about to start school, and I hated it so I've had it long ever since.  It was often long enough to sit on and never shorter than waist length.  Growing up, I identified myself with my hair, it was my one obvious good feature (it helped that it was naturally corn coloured).  I could never imagine having it cut, or indeed, ever wanting to have it cut.  Never mind the hours it took to dry, the inconvenience of having to tie it up all the time, the constant migraines and sensitive scalp, why would I want to let go of my one vanity?  I imagined myself eventually becoming a little old lady with a long silver plait coiled in a bun at the back of her head.  My hair was my strength, my identity.

Then one day I walked in into the hairdresser's, just for advice on how to deal with the drab, dry and thinning rat's tails my hair had become.  There were no customers.  She said, I'll cut it for you now if you want.  I looked in the mirror and, for a split second, saw an image of a different me.  Cut it to here, I said, tracing my jaw-line.  Deep breath...

And here I am, that different me, and I love it.  Why didn't I do this years ago?

It makes me wonder how many more of those tricky implicit assumptions are lurking in my life, leading me a merry dance in the wrong direction...