Best Advice?

What's the best advice? Probably to not give advice but, predictably,  I often do not take my own medicine.  It's my "sideline sage" conundrum and it takes grit-like self-control to listen without trying to tell someone how to fix their problem.  I've slowly learned to first reach for empathy but it can be a challenge. 

There are easy-to-grab pieces of advice that straddle the helpful/not helpful line.
On the practical side, I believe these nuggets hold up:

~Don't drink and drive.   ~Buy low; sell high.  ~Neither a borrower nor a lender be
~When in doubt, out       ~Know thyself          ~You can't always get what you want

In contrast, these don't:

~Everything happens for a reason     ~What doesn't kill you makes you stronger
~It could be worse   ~Time heals all wounds   ~Just be strong 
~God (or some deity) doesn't send you what you can't handle

I am more intrigued by the question of why do we give advice?  What's in it for the advice giver? Or for the receiver?  Is it the desire to help or to inject a tried and true fix? Are we careful/thoughtful enough to sense if advice is not what the situation needs? And on the receiving end, what are we really seeking?

The first rule of advice is that when someone brings us a problem, they may just want to hear themselves describe it aloud.  Perhaps they are looking for a friendly listener. However,   offering a fix is usually a first response, predictably employed by men.  I believe instead of defaulting to empathy, men instinctively go to the toolbox.  Why else would someone be sharing a problem with them? The logic is simple: problems need answers.

I have to admit, this has been part of my nature as well because: 
a) I want to help; 
b) I really think my advice fits as an answer to the problem; 
c) It's a comfort to feel I have the ingredients to create a nourishing answer that will fortify and be digestible.  

Oh, the sweet arrogance of it all.

Parents suffer this character flaw, often with good intent, because we frequently see ourselves as the answer holders - advice givers - for our kids.  It can be an act of love but it is so often encased in control.  Glennon Doyle (warrior, author, humorist, life guide) recently noted in one of her talks that she reluctantly has come to learn this from her  former relationships, "I thought I had very good ideas about how people should behave" and would advise them as such, all in the name of love.  

What she has since realized is that control is the opposite of love. In her words, "Love implies trust.  We only control things or people we don't trust fully."  Hmmm. I gave this thought a moment to crystallize, took a quick cerebral inventory, and whispered to myself, "This could be true." For now, I am mentally road testing her premise. 

Advice columnists have had the best jobs because they are paid to advise. Reading their meanderings is a sort of sidelong glance into other people's problems. Who doesn't enjoy reading a good old fashioned question/answer volley with nothing to lose?

While notable past newspaper columnists/advice givers - Dear Abby, Ann Landers, and Erma Bombeck - enjoyed immense popularity in the print world heydays, my favorite modern-day prescriptive provider has been author, Cheryl Strayed. Strayed cut her advice teeth as "Dear Sugar" on the writer focused Rumpus website in 2010.  

Selected letters and replies were compiled from her column in 2012 to create her book (and an eventual stage adaptation) tiny, beautiful things. My dog-eared copy of her book looks like a crazy first try at an origami project.  So much of what she writes resonates.  She shares chunks of herself in service to the problem presented.  This speaks to the irresistible power of her empathy while she holds the pain of her letter writers. 

This winter, my daughter and I saw the stage presentation of tiny, beautiful things. Upon arriving home, I reached for my book and thumbed through favorite parts gladly slipping into the comforting rabbit hole of Strayed's wisdom and love.  She lets the writer/reader know I see you; I hear you.  She keeps us whole while nudging us to consider what she offers.   
                               

My mental image of her is that of a virtual disaster aid volunteer; before she types one word in reply, she is draping our weary shoulders with a protective blanket while handing us something warm to sip. Then we take teensy steps from our emotional fortress and head across the tenuous bridge she builds to consider what she has to say.  One thing is certain:  we are intact all along the way.

Almost a year ago I came across a NY Times article asking readers to share the best advice they've received. Readers submitted their "best of" offerings and the author categorized them: Life Advice; Parenting Guidance; Work Life; Lightening Round.  My favorite of the bunch?  Take a breath. The article sat all those months in an "ideas" folder waiting for my consideration. No great light bulb moment was born from that idle time but little glimmers emerged.  

I decided to play along and share what I've read/been told: 

• Best life advice?  Feel the fear and do it anyway.  
• Parenting Guidance?  Your child will find who and what they are looking for.  Pay more attention to who your child is. 
• Work Life? Try something new every day.
• Lightening Round?  What we know matters but who we are matters more. (thank you Brene Brown)

When I sometimes hear a friend say, "I remember some advice you gave me when you said..." I cringe the cringiest cringe.

And then I take a breath. 

Dear Reader: What advice have you given? Received? Was any of it of value?  Why? Why not?

                                ~~~~~~~~~~~~

Link to a "10 best Sugar Columns" from tiny, beautiful things: 

https://www.vulture.com/2014/12/10-best-dear-sugar-columns-cheryl-strayed-wild.html

Link to NYTimes article asking readers to share the best advice they've received:   https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/30/smarter-living/best-advice-youve-ever-received.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&fbclid=IwAR0Hn610_LDJ9Jk9GP_zqdg676Yymk8d0fXALQI2y9-tge3ZxaKWRYEJo1Y