127 Assumption Quotes to Challenge Your Mindset and Ignite Personal Growth

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Famous Assumption Quotes

Ignorance is brought about by assumption. — T. D. Jakes

Assumptions are the termites of relationships. - Henry Winkler

Assumptions are the termites of relationships. — Henry Winkler

Assumptions allow the best in life to pass you by. — John Sales

The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct. — William of Ockham

Euclid taught me that without assumptions there is no proof. Therefore, in any argument, examine the assumptions. — Eric Temple Bell

Euclid taught me that without assumptions there is no proof. Therefore, in any argument, examine the assumptions. — E. T. Bell

Assumptions are unopened windows that foolish birds fly into, and their broken bodies are evidence gathered too late. — Bryan Davis

Never assume the obvious is true. - William Safire

Never assume the obvious is true. — William Safire

The least questioned assumptions are often the most questionable. - Paul Broca

The least questioned assumptions are often the most questionable. — Paul Broca

All proofs rest on premises. — Aristotle

Don’t commit to assumptions; instead, view them as hypotheses and use the negotiation to test them rigorously. — Chris Voss

Induction for deduction, with a view to construction. — Auguste Comte

Most of our assumptions have outlived their uselessness. — Marshall McLuhan

The most dangerous ideas in a society are not the ones being argued, but the ones that are assumed. — C. S. Lewis

Still, intuitive assumptions about behavior is only the starting point of systematic analysis, for alone they do not yield many interesting implications. — Gary Becker

Short Assumption Quotes

  • Discomfort challenges us to question our assumptions and expand our perspectives. — Michael Easter
  • Until we know the assumptions in which we are drenched, we cannot know ourselves. — Adrienne Rich
  • Having our fundamental assumptions about life challenged is never a comfortable thing. — Maajid Nawaz
  • Don’t count your chickens before they hatch. — English Proverbs
  • But oftentimes celestial benedictions Assume this dark disguise. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
  • I am not yet dead, but they have lit my candles — Greek Proverbs
  • Alcohol is the only drug where if you don’t do it, people assume you have a problem. — Chris Williamson
  • You can’t build a better mind without challenging your own beliefs and assumptions. — Mark Manson
  • The assumption of an absolute determinism is the essential foundation of every scientific enquiry. — Max Planck
  • The way to keep yourself from making assumptions is to ask questions. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

Assumption Image Quotes

Assumption quote Assumptions are the termites of relationships.
Assumptions are the termites of relationships.

Bad Assumption Quotes

It is by education that we become prepared for our duties and responsibilities in life. If one is badly educated he must naturally fail in the proper assumption and practice of his duties and responsibilities. — Marcus Garvey

The argument that 'boys will be boys' actually carries the profoundly anti-male implication that we should expect bad behavior from boys and men. The assumption is that they are somehow not capable of acting appropriately, or treating girls and women with respect. — Jackson Katz

A recovery of the old sense of sin is essential to Christianity. Christ takes it for granted that men are bad. Until we really feel this assumption of His to be true, though we are part of the world He came to save, we are not part of the audience to whom His words are addressed. — C. S. Lewis

Assumption quote My assumption is that the story of any one of us is in some measure the story of us all.
My assumption is that the story of any one of us is in some measure the story of us all.

There is no sound basis upon which it may be assumed that all poor men are godly and all rich men are evil, no more than it could be assumed that all rich men are good and all poor men are bad. — Norman Vincent Peale

The sneak-peeks you get off the top are of them in their real life. You're more invested, you know both of them, and you've already made assumptions. A murder who would murders someone - that makes them immediately bad - but here you see them in a different. — Kristin Lehman

Contrary to popular assumptions, the Bible is not a record of the blessed good, but rather the blessed bad. Thats not a typo. The Bible is a record of the blessed bad. The Bible is not a witness to the best people making it up to God; its a witness to God making it down to the worst people. — Tullian Tchividjian

There's this whole assumption that girls like bad boys, but I have to disagree; I think 'nice' will go a long way. — Brooke Burke

Self Assumption Quotes

Culture is the deeper level of basic assumptions and beliefs that are shared by members of an organization, that operate unconsciously and define in a basic 'taken for granted' fashion an organization's view of its self and its environment. — Edgar Schein

Agnosticism is epistemologically self-contradictory on its own assumptions because its claim to make no assertion about ultimate reality rests upon a most comprehensive assertion about ultimate reality. — Cornelius Van Til

Along with others, I have tried to pry economists away from narrow assumptions about self interest. Behavior is driven by a much richer set of values and preferences. — Gary Becker

Facts that challenge basic assumptions-and thereby threaten people's livelihood and self-esteem-are simply not absorbed. The mind does not digest them. — Daniel Kahneman

A self-fulfilling prophecy is an assumption or prediction that, purely as a result of having been made, cause the expected or predicted event to occur and thus confirms its own 'accuracy.' — Paul Watzlawick

God is not a hypothesis derived from logical assumptions, but an immediate insight, self-evident as light. He is not something to be sought in the darkness with the light of reason. He is the light. — Abraham Joshua Heschel

The assumption being that if high-risk children could be made to 'feel good about themselves,' these epidemics could be mitigated. ... This prescription, unfortunately, has proven to be yet another in a long list of nouveau homilies that haven't lived up to their promises. — John Rosemond

Of all the self-fulfilling prophecies in our culture, the assumption that aging means decline and poor health is probably the deadliest. — Marilyn Ferguson

Julian Jaynes's theories for the nature of self-awareness, introspection, and consciousness have replaced the assumption of their almost ethereal uniqueness with explanations that could initiate the next change in paradigm for human thought. — Michael Persinger

I'd like to walk that fine line between the authentic artist self and the manufactured artist self. I'd like to exist outside of a set of expectations or assumptions about what the Kehinde Wiley brand is. And I'd like to walk towards something that's a bit more unpredictable, human. — Kehinde Wiley

False Assumption Quotes

I have learned throughout my life as a composer chiefly through my mistakes and pursuits of false assumptions, not by my exposure to founts of wisdom and knowledge. — Igor Stravinsky

The course hitherto pursued in musical aesthetics has nearly always been hampered by the false assumption that the object was not so much to inquire into what is beautiful in music as to describe the feelings which music awakens. — Eduard Hanslick

We build buildings based on the false assumption that women go to mosques half as much as they actually do. In fact, the US is the only country in the world where women and men report that they attend the mosque in equal numbers, but our institutions aren't representing this reality. — Dalia Mogahed

By deceiving one another through false assumptions and misrepresentations there has been, in reality, a great lapse and delay in achieving the real goals. — Dalai Lama

To refuse a hearing to an opinion, because they are sure that it is false, is to assume that their certainty is the same thing as absolute certainty. All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility. — John Stuart Mill

Revealed insights should leave us stricken with the knowledge of how little we really know. It should never lead to an emotional arrogance based upon a false assumption that we somehow have all the answers - that we in fact have a corner on truth. For we do not. — Hugh B. Brown

Trust your gut instinct over spreadsheets. There are too many variables in the real world that you simply can't put into a spreadsheet. Spreadsheets spit out results from your inexact assumptions and give you a false sense of security. In most cases, your heart and gut are still your best guide. — Naveen Jain

A central theme of all about love is that from childhood into adulthood we are often taught misguided and false assumptions about the nature of love. Perhaps the most common false assumption about love is that love means we will not be challenged or changed. — Bell Hooks

A theory is only as good as its assumptions. If the premises are false, the theory has no real scientific value. The only scientific criterion for judging the validity of a scientific theory is a confrontation with the data of experience. — Maurice Allais

If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you believe something is right or wrong, true or false, you believe the assumptions in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of holes, but remain most precious to the convinced. — Frank Herbert

Wrong Assumption Quotes

Pause and remember - Making the wrong assumptions causes pain and suffering for everyone. — Jennifer Young

While analogies are useful, however, they can also be misleading. They smuggle in assumptions that can be wrong. — Michael Mandelbaum

All too often we're filled with negative and limiting beliefs. We're filled with doubt. We're filled with guilt or with a sense of unworthiness. We have a lot of assumptions about the way the world is that are actually wrong. — Jack Canfield

Three big assumptions proved wrong: one, that the Iraqi people would welcome us as liberators; two, that oil would soon pay for Iraqi's rebuilding; and, three, that we have plenty of troops, weapons, and equipment for the postwar situation. — John Spratt

If you look at the history of big obstacles in understanding our world, there's usually an intuitive assumption underlying them that's wrong. — Jeff Hawkins

There can be no assumption that today's majority is right and the Amish and others like them are wrong. A way of life that is odd or even erratic but interferes with no rights or interests of others is not to be condemned because it is different. — Warren Earl Burger

One of the prevailing sources of misery and crime is in the generally accepted assumption, that because things have been wrong a long time, it is impossible they will ever be right. — John Ruskin

There can be no assumption that today's majority is "right" and the Amish and others like them are "wrong." A way of life that is odd or even erratic but interferes with no rights or interests of others is not to be condemned because it is different. — Warren E. Burger

When assumptions were made that I was going to bail out there was a little part of my brain that thought 'I am going to do to prove them wrong'. In the end that wouldn't be coming from my heart and doing what was right. — Craig Stevens

People just assume, over the years, that soccer players are not too intelligent. As with most assumptions, they're wrong. — David Beckham

Making Assumption Quotes

Invite people into your life who don't look or act like you. You might find they challenge your assumptions and make you grow. — Mellody Hobson

I love to start characters in a place where you think you know them. We can make all kinds of assumptions about them and think they have no redeeming qualities, but like everyone, they're complex. — Callie Khouri

Unfortunately, there’s a pessimistic assumption here that people make that human creativity is bounded, and I think it’s the people who have not built things, who have not created new things from scratch, who seem to feel this the most. — Naval Ravikant

At its best, travel should challenge our preconceptions and most cherished views, cause us to rethink our assumptions, shake us a bit, make us broader minded and more understanding. — Arthur Frommer

I think we should all live on the precipe of life, as fully and as dangerously as possible. Everyone should make the assumption that they're going through life only once. Tomorrow we die. Why not take chances, extend yourself? How awful it is when a person comes to the end of life full of regret. — Edward Albee

We're living in a whole new social and economic order with a whole new set of problems and challenges. Old assumptions and old programs don't work in this new society and the more we try to stretch them to make them fit, the more we will be seen as running away from what is reality. — Ann Richards

Don’t listen to opinions, unless you are also given an insight into the assumptions made for making those opinions. — Thomas Phelps

The heart and soul of school culture is what people believe, the assumptions they make about how school works. — Thomas J. Sergiovanni

Treat with utmost respect your power of forming opinions, for this power alone guards you against making assumptions that are contrary to nature and judgments that overthrow the rule of reason. — Marcus Aurelius

Don't Make Assumptions. Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

Don't Make Assumption Quotes

Don't make assumptions. Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

The Four Agreements 1. Be impeccable with your word. 2. Don’t take anything personally. 3. Don’t make assumptions. 4. Always do your best. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

And the Russians certainly don't have it. If a woman shows up in a fur coat, I just assume she's a crook. And that's me, the nice American. The assumption that you can't make money honestly is a killer. — Esther Dyson

Don't make assumptions. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

The most misleading assumptions are the ones you don't even know you're making. — Douglas Adams

We make all sorts of assumptions because we don't have the courage to ask questions. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

The place was crawling with youngsters. It was good, because the kids were good. I can't make a general assumption. Again, you're probably getting, as a general theme from me, that I don't make a lot of broad, sweeping rules about movies. — Adam Arkin

I think often if people don't have a lot of experience with a particular type of person or a particular type of brain, they can make dangerous assumptions. That's one of the reasons that I'm so interested in contradicting and troubling held thoughts about black women. — Morgan Parker

Assumptions are what we don't know we are making — Douglas Adams

The hardest assumption to challenge is the one you don't even know you are making. — Douglas Adams

People Writing About Assumption

Name Quotes Likes
Read quotes by T. D. Jakes

T. D. Jakes
quotes on letting go, self love and purpose

247 32111
Read quotes by Henry Winkler

Henry Winkler
quotes on learning

41 422
Read quotes by William of Ockham

William of Ockham
quotes on education, religion and colonialism

22 479
Read quotes by Eric Temple Bell

Eric Temple Bell
quotes on leadership, freedom and education

29 221
Read quotes by E. T. Bell

E. T. Bell
quotes on education, leadership and life

14 187
Read quotes by Bryan Davis

Bryan Davis
quotes on leadership, education and diversity

19 61

More Assumption Quotes

Dr. King's policy was, if you are nonviolent, if you suffer, your opponent will see your suffering and will be moved to change his heart. That's very good. He only made one fallacious assumption. In order for nonviolence to work, your opponent must have a conscience. The United States has none. — Stokely Carmichael

The individual comes face-to-face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind has not come to a realisation of the evil which has been introduced into our midst. It rejects even the assumption that human creatures could espouse a philosophy which must ultimately destroy all that is good and decent. — J. Edgar Hoover

We have lived our lives by the assumption that what was good for us would be good for the world. We have been wrong. We must change our lives so that it will be possible to live by the contrary assumption, that what is good for the world will be good for us. And that requires that we make the effort to know the world and learn what is good for it. — Wendell Berry

Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well- warmed, and well-fed. — Herman Melville

You must assume the feeling of the wish fulfilled until your assumption has all the sensory vividness of reality. You must imagine that you are already experiencing what you desire. That is, you must assume the feeling of the fulfillment of your desire until you are possessed by it and this feeling crowds all other ideas out of your consciousness. — Neville Goddard

Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well-warmed, and well-fed. — Herman Melville

We cannot safely assume that other people's minds work on the same principles as our own. All too often, others with whom we come in contact do not reason as we reason, or do not value the things we value, or are not interested in what interests us. — Isabel Briggs Myers

A pattern of shared basic assumptions invented, discovered, or developed by a given group as it learns to cope with its problems of external adaptation and internal integration that have worked well enough to be considered valid and therefore, to be taught to new members as the correct way to perceive, think and feel in relation to those problems. — Edgar Schein

All of us have our own inner fears, beliefs, opinions. These inner assumptions rule and govern our lives. A suggestion has no power in and of itself. its power arises from the fact that you accept it mentally. — Joseph Murphy

It is the growing custom to narrow control, concentrate power, disregard and disenfranchise the public; and assuming that certain powers by divine right of money-raising or by sheer assumption, have the power to do as they think best without consulting the wisdom of mankind. — W. E. B. Du Bois

The fate of millions of people—indeed the future of the black community itself—may depend on the willingness of those who care about racial justice to re-examine their basic assumptions about the role of the criminal justice system in our society. — Michelle Alexander

If a radical devolution of powers was possible, it would have been done before. The assumption of states' rights is gone. There's no support for it in the Supreme Court and there's no support for it in public opinion. — James Q. Wilson

You are not naked when you take off your clothes. You still wear your religious assumptions, your prejudices, your fears, your illusions, your delusions. When you shed the cultural operating system, then essentially you stand naked before the inspection of your own psyche. — Terence McKenna

The assumption that animals are without rights, and the illusion that our treatment of them has no moral significance, is a positively outrageous example of Western crudity and barbarity. Universal compassion is the only guarantee of morality. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Question your thoughts. Question your stories. Question your assumptions. Question your opinions. Question your conclusions. Question them all into utter emptiness, stillness and joy. The keys to freedom are in your hands. Use them. — Adyashanti

The assumption that what currently exists must necessarily exist is the acid that corrodes all visionary thinking. — Murray Bookchin

I try to encourage people to think for themselves, to question standard assumptions... Don't take assumptions for granted. Begin by taking a skeptical attitude toward anything that is conventional wisdom. Make it justify itself. It usually can't. Be willing to ask questions about what is taken for granted. Try to think things through for yourself. — Noam Chomsky

The mo’ money I made, the more miserable I became. Which led me to simply work harder and buy more toys on the misguided assumption that, sooner or later, all this effort was going to pay off and I’d find the pot of gold—happiness—thought to lie at the end of the high-achievement rainbow. I’d become a hamster on what psychologists call the 'hedonic treadmill'. The more you get, the more you want. The more you strive, the more reasons you discover for striving. — Mo Gawdat

So it is questioning these deepest assumptions we have—where we think there’s no possible way we could be mistaken—that leads to true progress and to a genuine, fundamental change in the sciences and everywhere else. — Naval Ravikant

We should not assume; however, that just because something is unexplainable by us, it is unexplainable. — Neal A. Maxwell

Ninety percent of the book variations have no great value, because either they contain mistakes or they are based on fallacious assumptions; just forget about the openings and spend all that time on the endings. — Jose Raul Capablanca

Blind faith, no matter how passionately expressed, will not suffice. Science for its part will test relentlessly every assumption about the human condition. — E. O. Wilson

There’s a core assumption that growth is always good, is always unlimited, and is required for success. — Paul Jarvis

Polls can change; people's opinions can change. Voting intentions can change, and I think it would be a silly leader, a silly political party, that would assume that we have it sewn up. — Nicola Sturgeon

I think of veganism humbly and holistically. It's about taking personal responsibility in a world so full of needless suffering. It's challenging one's self to open one's eyes and question society's assumptions and habits. It's about critical thinking and compassion and how we would like to see the world evolve. — Michael Greger

History is malleable. A new cache of diaries can shed new light, and archeological evidence can challenge our popular assumptions. — Ken Burns

Great negotiators are able to question the assumptions that the rest of the involved players accept on faith or in arrogance, and thus remain more emotionally open to all possibilities, and more intellectually agile to a fluid situation. — Chris Voss

We need a type of patriotism that recognizes the virtues of those who are opposed to us..... The old "manifest destiny" idea ought to be modified so that each nation has the manifest destiny to do the best it can - and that without cant, without the assumption of self-righteousness and with a desire to learn to the uttermost from other nations. — Francis John McConnell

In Conclusion

Assumption quotes remind us that assumptions can hinder communication and relationships. They highlight the need for clarity and understanding in our interactions with others. These quotes encourage us to question the assumptions we make about people based on their appearance, background, or beliefs. They remind us that assumptions can lead to misunderstandings and prejudice. By being aware of our assumptions and actively trying to overcome them, we can foster better connections with others and create a more inclusive and accepting society.

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