An assumption is something you are treating as true without having fully checked it in the situation in front of you.
Some assumptions make ordinary life possible. You don’t investigate the existence of a floor every time you stand up. Others quietly turn a guess about a person into a rule about what you can ask.
You decided they wouldn’t want to hear it. Did they get a vote?
You expect a question to annoy a colleague, so you spend an hour guessing what they need. Perhaps experience supports your caution. Perhaps they would have preferred a two-minute conversation.
The useful question isn’t "Should I trust myself?" in the abstract. It’s "What am I basing this particular expectation on?"
You may decide to ask. You may keep your caution and seek information another way. Either choice is clearer when the assumption is visible.
Evidence helps distinguish support from familiarity. Interpretation explains how an observed detail and an assumed meaning can become tangled.
Noba’s Judgment and Decision Making explores how we reach conclusions with incomplete information. It is a useful companion to the small but consequential word "obviously."