Snap Judgment Errors

Everyone is at some point in time whether intentional or not guilty of judging someone or something before getting all the information needed to make an opinion instead of an assumption. Common errors in judgment affect our ability to creatively think, which I know I am guilty of a couple of judgment errors. (Bethel, 2013, pg. 4) Projection which is blaming your faults on others because everyone does it is something I am personally guilty of doing. (Bethel, 2013, pg.4) I remember in high school getting caught skipping class, all I could say at the time was I did it because all my friends were doing it and I wanted to be with them, which is peer pressure at it finest but still not a valid excuse. I should have been honest about why I felt it was okay for me to skip that one class. I hated that class, and it was the
class I always got in trouble in for falling behind since my teacher was not willing to help me with what I did not understand. Why be in her class at all, she did not even notice I was not there since she marked me as attending for class.
I learned to own up to my mistakes because laying blame on others was not going to get me out of trouble. Snap judgments are made based on not knowing all the facts before making a decision about how you feel towards someone or something. (Bethel, 2013, pg.4) Not knowing all the facts can cause you to misjudge based on the potentially unreliable information. I feel like snap judgments are like the saying “Don't judge a book by its cover.” If you do not open the book and do strong research how will you truly know about something. After graduating high school, I had plans to move to Virginia, even though everyone told me it was a dangerous place to live and the people were just ignorant, lazy individuals. I had already done my research on where I was planning to move too. I studied crime rate, job rates, housing cost, and the laws of the state but what people were telling me made me scared, and I began negatively about the situation. After arriving and getting settled, I started to meet a couple of people and realized all my fear was
unwarranted. The people were so welcoming of an out of towner and taught me a lot about not judging something based on how others may have perceived it cause its a big state with many different walks of life. Bad things can happen anywhere you go but if you know where you are going and what type of community it is there should be no reservations about the path you are taking. I have also learned that the most common error in judgment I am most guilty of is sweeping generalizations which are basing one experience and generalization to a whole group. (Bethel, 2013, pg.4) When I was a teenager, I found myself in trouble with the law, and as a result, I ended up on probation. As someone who had never been in trouble, I found myself lost and confused over the next few months. My assumption when I was placed on probation and told I would need to take some classes to help me with what I had been in trouble for was that I was going to receive help on how to overcome what I was battling at the time. My first experience being arrested and detained had already made me question law enforcement as a whole. I was thrown on the ground and told I needed to be transported due to an overdose. I tried to explain that I was having a panic attack since this was not the first one I had ever had but the cop reassured me I had no idea what I was talking about and proceeded to tell me I was just another drug addict. I let this one experience make my opinion about the cops, lawyers, and probation officer, which was that they were all there to make my life worse and not help me. This made the first couple months tough for me. I landed back in jail along with a change in probation officers every couple months which meant my new officer had no idea of what the former officer and I had been working on to help me remain out of jail and on the path to staying out of trouble so I could better my life. In time I found people along my journey that helped me see not all cops are bad people some are just medically uneducated. It has also helped me to the journey I am now on with Bethel Unversity. I have seen my share of people who should not be working to rehabilitate people, and I want to help others to not go through the hard times that I went through. I want to show others that just because you make one mistake in life does not mean you can not bounce back and become a stronger individual. Only you can change yourself but to have people who understand and support you bettering yourself helps you mentally believe in yourself and that is critical.

Reference: Bethel University. (2013). College Orientation Experience.
Retrieved from: https://betheluniversityonline.net/cps/