Benefit of the Doubt
by Michael Feeley
Two words that almost sound like opposites.
Benefit—something good, something given freely.
Doubt—hesitation, suspicion, the part of you that isn’t sure.
Put them together, and you get one of the more generous things a person can do: choosing good faith in spite of a reason not to.
It isn’t blind trust. Blind trust has no doubt in it at all. This is different. You see the 20% that makes you pause, and you consciously act on the 80% that says lead with positivity anyway. That’s a choice, not an accident, and it takes both wisdom and a little courage to make it. Courage, because you’re exposing yourself to being wrong. Wisdom, because you’re betting that most people, most of the time, deserve the high road.
The benefit of the doubt isn’t a permanent status, either. It’s a grant, not a guarantee. You extend it once, maybe twice, and if someone fails to come through with honor, you’re not obligated to keep renewing it. Recognizing that boundary is part of the practice, not a failure of it.
And if you’re 100% sure? Then the idiom doesn’t apply. There’s no doubt left to give the benefit of.
As I get older, I see this differently. Suspicion can feel like the safer, faster instinct. But choosing to extend trust anyway (eyes open, doubt intact) feels less like naivety and more like something earned. A form of generosity that deepens with age, rather than one that fades.
Thanks – Michael (he, him)
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This also matters – The Question of Trust.
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