Making assumptions is a natural human tendency. We look at how things are going and filter them through our experiences.

As a business owner, making assumptions, on the one hand, is vital to predict market direction and be ahead of the curve - but these are calculated assumptions.

On the other hand, making assumptions will make you spend years headed in the wrong direction. It's extremely dangerous for your business success to make unproven assumptions.

We have to become relentless with proving any assumptions we have.

You might assume someone wants to buy a product from you, or there's a need in the marketplace, but you won't know for sure until you test it out.

Some people become addicted to making assumptions - because there's a rush in assuming things before they happen.

You have to take action and DISPROVE your assumptions. Notice, I didn't say prove them. You want to disprove your assumptions. Trying to prove them, you'll always find someone to validate you.

But you focus on getting more NOs than yes's; you'll figure out precisely what the marketplace wants.

You might also make assumptions in your leadership style that are dead wrong. By assuming that someone can do a take or be willing, you invite unnecessary drama into your life instead of just speaking directly.

Clearly expressing expectations in all interactions and not making assumptions will increase your ability to make money.

You might be used to making assumptions as a survival mechanism. It may even terrify you to prove or disprove them, and you prefer things to "happen naturally." As a business owner, the only natural thing you can do is take action to prove or disprove anything.

You have to figure out what the truth is in your assumptions. You have to do due diligence as fast as possible.

People take months figuring out what they assume when this is the first step of the journey. Taking months to figure out your assumptions will make you go broke.

You want to prove your assumptions as fast as possible - and learn as much as you can about your audience, about the marketplace, about your staff members, by asking questions.

And this is the risk: when you start proving or disproving your assumptions, you will discover an incredible truth - a painful one in the beginning, that you will embrace:

You are often WRONG about what you assume. I don't care how many times you've been right before or made correct assumptions; this statement is 100% true when you become honest with yourself. You are often wrong about what you assume.

When we can embrace this as part of the process, we can prove what we assume, we can learn where we are wrong, we ENJOY discovering beliefs that we held to that were untrue - and changing them, you can grow a business to be successful.

We have to stop avoiding being proven wrong and start embracing proving ourselves wrong to discover what the truth is to grow our businesses. When you embrace this - everything will begin to fall into place for you.

We can often assume that the people around us aren't willing to help us. We might assume that we are a burden on someone or that they are incapable of helping us in a certain way. These assumptions will lead you to overlook the kind of help that is already around you.

You have everything you need in your life to reach your goals RIGHT NOW if you become aware of it.

The first step is to stop assuming things and to start taking action.