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Resolutions, Rules, and Assumptions
It's the beginning of a new year, that bittersweet time of hopeful resolutions. Even with plenty of data showing that most of us will abandon our resolutions by Groundhog Day, we still make them.
The tradition of New Year's Resolutions feels like a rule. Abandoning the resolution once we've broken it seems to have become part of the tradition, too, a kind of "rule, part 2."
But where is it written that resolutions may only be made on January first? Or that we should or must proclaim a goal on that day, even if we routinely set (or never set) goals and objectives throughout the year? Who decided that once broken, giving up until the next year was what we should all do?
Musing over my own resolution making and my reluctance to commit to any of the usual self-improvement promises, I consider this idea of rules, and of the difference between rules and assumptions, and how that affects our behavior and our understanding of the world.
We do (or don't do) a certain thing because we believe there's an existing rule that tells us to do (or not do) that certain thing. The "thing" could be as simple as placing commas in a series of nouns, as complex as earning an advanced degree in physics.
But often, it isn't really a rule; it's an assumption. And the assumption is so strong, so firmly believed, that it has the strength—the feel—of a rule.
Some assumptions—New Year's resolutions are a good example—are based on tradition. We've done something the same way for so long that we assume it must be done that way, and we keep doing it. That's not necessarily a bad thing; it is good to periodically review our lives, think about what we want in the future, and plan how we might accomplish that.
But it's not necessarily a good thing, either. Assumptions masquerading as rules corral our creativity. It can be tough to break through the barricade they form.
When I was in first grade, one of our early reader books had a verse that ended with the line, "And no one can go to the moon!" I remember the teacher reinforcing that bit of "science" by laughing and saying how silly it was to think anyone could go to the moon. I remember feeling disappointed, because going to the moon sounded like a great adventure, something I'd definitely want to do. But no, it wasn't allowed.
Nine and a half years later, Apollo 11 landed on the moon. I was at summer camp, between backpacking trips, and watched the broadcast on a tiny, black-and-white TV sitting on a table at the far end of the mess hall. I remember how thrilled I was, how excited my fellow campers were. I also remember feeling vindicated; the people in the space program had refused to believe the "rule" from that old poem. They had broken through the barricade and gone to the moon.
Most barricade bashing happens closer to home. My friend and colleague Jen Louden tells the story of attending a workshop where the instructor blindfolded a volunteer, and the volunteer had to move something from one place to another on a desk while the audience members called out instructions to help her accomplish the task. What the audience saw but the volunteer didn't know was that a mouse trap was in the center of the desk. If the audience couldn't help her navigate properly, the volunteer would catch her hand in the mousetrap.
At some point, Jen called out a question: Is it all right to tell her?
The instructor blinked in surprise and said no one had ever asked that before; she'd never even thought about it. But there wasn't a rule against it, so sure, go ahead.
"There's a mousetrap on the table, right in the middle, near your hand!" Jen shouted.
I try to image myself in Jen's place. I would probably have made the same assumption, that it was not okay to actually tell the volunteer about the mouse trap. Somehow, it feels like cheating if we tell the volunteer exactly what she needs to know. That's partly the set-up—it feels like a guessing game, one where the fun (and the goal) is to help the volunteer (the victim?) accomplish the task without revealing the "trick" of the mouse trap. If we tell her that it's two inches to the left of her hand and she'll avoid it if she raises her hand six inches, it circumvents the game's rule—except there is no such rule.
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