THE CARD
A thought for the day.
The pig needed treatment. My imagination needed supervision.
Our mini pigs had lice. A video mentioned treatment “in the butt.”
My brain heard “UP the butt.”
Oh, hell no. I didn’t sign up for this.
I was already texting my resignation from pig nursing when I finally asked someone to explain.
They meant an injection into a muscle.
Oh. Entirely different assignment.
Recovery keeps teaching me this, too. I can misunderstand something with absolute confidence.
Sometimes I need to stop arguing with what I think I heard and ask somebody who knows.
What am I saying “hell no” to before I understand it?
THE LESSON BEHIND THE LESSON
Ask before the imagination takes over.
Give my brain half a sentence and it can produce an entire emergency. Sometimes it even sends a resignation letter before it has the facts.
The pig story makes me laugh, but the habit shows up elsewhere. I can be completely confident about what I think someone meant and still be completely wrong.
A simple question—“Can you explain what you mean?”—gives me a chance to understand before I react. I can be willing to be wrong without making myself wrong as a person.
Where could I ask one more question before deciding what I heard?