When we don’t know the full story, it’s natural for us to fill in the blanks. This tends to happen a lot with casual acquaintances. We know a few things about a person and then we make a whole bunch of assumptions.

Over time, if we’re not careful, we might begin to conflate the two. That is, we’ll treat “what we know about a person” and “what we think we know about a person” as the same thing.

Two things we can do:

One, be conscious. Know the difference between things we’ve learned about someone … and narratives we’ve invented.

And two, be curious. Ask questions. Have a conversation. Actually get to know the person. Turns out, first-hand knowledge is a great way to keep assumptions in check.