A few days ago, I read an article titled The Worst & Best Advice I’ve Ever Gotten and it got me thinking about the advice I’ve received over the years. Susannah writes specifically about advice relating to work. I’m thinking about all kinds of advice I’ve received and this is the conclusion that I am coming to:
1) Most often, I am not looking for or asking for advice. Mostly what I want is to be seen, heard and acknowledged. I want someone to say: “Yes, I see that you feel like that” or “Wow, that really is a difficult problem to solve” or “Oh, would you like a hug?”
2) The reason that I share my challenges and problems is because putting things out of my head into the air (or onto this blog) is how I work it out. I need to say things or write things to know how it feels. If I need to convince someone (read: myself) that I’ve come to the ‘best’ decision, I might need to go over the same ground a few times, until I am sure that I understand how I feel and what the possible reactions will be.
Not everyone does this. Some people work everything out in their heads and then put it out to the world. That doesn’t make me wrong, it makes me, me.
3) About 2 weeks ago I wrote about believing in myself to have the best answers for me, in a post titled Believe. I wrote about how often I take other peoples advice over my own, because of my generally feelings of unworthiness. The crux is that because we can’t possibly know the difference between 2 or 3 outcomes ahead of time, we can’t possibly know that one is better than another, the best that we can hope for is a decision that we can live with. My bottom line is that I have God given wisdom inside of me (Gut Feeling) and the better I get at acting on it, the stronger those feelings get.
4) Sometimes the problems in my life get me so down, and I really would love a knight in shining armor to come in and save me. No, actually this feeling is with me most of the time, and sometimes I surrender to its omnipotent pull. In these times, I look out into the world for other peoples strength, to have the answers for me. I want them to have advice for me and the irony is that in these times, I usually don’t like what they offer, because mostly it requires that I stop being a victim 😦
This is the wounded child in me, the part that needs to be healed, and that is work for a lifetime.
5) Baz Luhrmann gives some great advice on advice:
Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who
supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of
fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the
ugly parts and recycling it for more than
it’s worth.
6) The best advice for me is my own. As I recovery in the 12 Step program, I become more aware of my preferences, I get to know myself. I take responsibility for my choices and decisions. I do the best that I can, and I learn to live with it, because I love myself.
I also learn to love others, which means keeping my advice to myself, unless I am asked for it. I learn to see, hear & acknowledge others and I give them space to work out their problems while I listen respectfully.
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One of the things that I learnt from being in a Recovery Fellowship was that I had choices. Prior to being in recovery, I felt like I had no choices. I felt trapped, cornered, caged. Now I started to see that every time I kept quiet instead of saying what I wanted, I was choosing to not get my needs met. When I did nothing instead of doing something scary, I was choosing to keep things the same.
My Recovery in 12 Steps 