How do I practice facts vs opinions?

The most direct way to practice facts vs opinions is through a focused exercise: Pick one situation from the past 24 hours that bothered you. Write two columns on a page. Left column: 'What a camera would record' — only observable, verifiable data (words said, actions taken, timestamps, measurable outcomes). Right column: 'The story I told about it' — every interpretation, assumption, motive you assigned, and conclusion you drew. Notice the ratio. Most people find the story column is three to five times longer than the fact column.

Common pitfall: Disguising stories as facts by using factual-sounding language. 'He was being passive-aggressive' feels like an observation but it's an interpretation. 'She doesn't care about quality' sounds like a conclusion drawn from evidence but it's a story about someone's internal state. The subtlest failure is when you genuinely cannot tell which column a statement belongs in — that's the signal you need more practice, not less.

This practice connects to Phase 5 (Observation Without Judgment) — building it as a repeatable habit compounds over time.