Coaching practices for Questioning Assumptions

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Questioning Assumptions, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

• I’m grinding hard on "how do I fix this" and a quiet doubt keeps surfacing that I might be solving the wrong problem entirely
• My conclusion only makes sense because of a bunch of things I’m silently taking for granted about people and how the world works
• My conclusion feels airtight and yet something nags at me, and I think it’s that the whole thing only holds if a couple of unspoken things are true
• There’s this thing I’m treating as obviously true and building everything on top of
• In my head the things I’m sure of and the things I’m just guessing at all run together as one blur, so I end up treating my assumptions like hard limits

Practices that may help

1. Question the question itself
   Before answering a question, ask whether it is the right question and whether it is framed to produce useful answers.
   Socratic Questioning
2. Surface and examine the assumptions you are making
   Name the assumptions filling the gap between the data you selected and the interpretation you reached.
   The Ladder of Inference
3. Surface and test underlying assumptions
   Identify the implicit assumptions that your reasoning depends on and test whether they hold.
   Socratic Questioning
4. Use Socratic questioning to test each belief
   Interrogate every claim with “how do I know this is true?” until only bedrock remains.
   First-Principles Thinking, Made Usable
5. Separate facts from assumptions explicitly
   Sort what you actually know from what you’re assuming, in two visible columns.
   First-Principles Thinking, Made Usable
6. Test the big assumption behind your immunity
   Design a small experiment to check whether the assumption keeping you stuck is actually true.
   Kegan’s Subject-Object Theory, Made Practical
7. Explore the implications and consequences of a position
   Ask "if that is true, what follows?" to test whether accepting a claim creates downstream problems.
   Socratic Questioning
8. Surface and test the mental models driving behavior
   Make the assumptions behind decisions explicit — they are often the root structural cause.
   Systems Thinking
9. Seek conversations with people from radically different fields
   Let a conversation partner from another domain ask the naive questions that expose your hidden assumptions.
   Combinatorial Creativity, Made Practical
10. Map and stress-test your key assumptions
    Before executing, list the assumptions the plan depends on — then ask which ones would kill it if wrong.
    Red Teaming: Stress-Testing Plans Before They Fail

Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.