Dear Abby isn’t available.
Advice and Consent
Typically, most humans give advice without getting consent. It is amazing how easy it is to tell someone else how to live their life. Think about a family member who loves to give advice. They must have fast analytical skills that enable them to let everyone else know the best way to do things. The missing components are permission and actual knowledge. Most humans do not want or need advice on how to live their lives. In fact, it is easily resented. If you have ever been the victim of someone’s advice you know what I mean. Self-coaching is a relative of advice.
Don’t Tell Don’t Ask
My number two rule is not to give advice to family members if it is not requested. That lets me off the hook to the expectation that I could provide some sage wisdom that I may not have. This is a copout on advice. But this would be a great method to follow overall. There are legitimate reasons not to give advice. You don’t have all of the pertinent information to start with. And your advice is not good either. Sorry. Advice isn’t generic if it is any good. Advice should be requested based on deep knowledge, a past record of excellent results and a willingness to have it ignored. Free advice givers don’t like to be ignored and that is the swiftest way to get them to resent giving away that free junk.
Made up Advice
Brains are happy to look for patterns and make connections to reassure your nervous-nelly self that you are doing the correct thing. But unwanted advice is mostly conjecture with a sprinkle of truth. But we each feel that our own advice is excellent based on how something worked out for us. So, providing your own well thought out advice is a gift. As we have discussed previously, the first opinions of others are mostly junk because they are based on their needs. The impulse to relieve frustration is hard-wired into us and most humans don’t want others to suffer. Hence, advice is freely strewn about.
Dangerous Advice
The real danger of accepting advice is the chance of damaging one’s ability to think. Humans need to think for themselves. This is a basis for self-coaching. You must be able to trust that your own innate ability to choose for yourself is far superior to anyone else’s. The best way for me to state the importance of thinking for yourself is how it will affect your ability to self-coach. Improving your own world through self-coaching involves self-work. You will literally be giving yourself advice. This will come from a trusted place and a trusted source. Doing it yourself for yourself cannot be beat. You don’t even need to sit patiently while eccentric family members provide help. And even when they give it, you can just smile and nod. They know you never listen.
Listen to yourself. Self-coaching is the best self-advice. Trust your sources.
