In the last lesson we looked at how the dumbest thing we can do socially is tell people unwanted advice or opinions because it comes across as critical and condescending since it suggests we know better than them. The problem is we’re drawn to sharing because we want to feel helpful and we can be passionate about certain topics like dating and parenting, but this kind of direct sharing puts us in an aggressive category. Coincidentally, the wisest thing we can do socially (besides being social) is being open to other people’s advice and opinions. It’s crazy; I know. This lesson is repeated many times in the Book of Proverbs, the wisdom book of the Bible (e.g. “Fools think their own way is right, but the wise listen to others” (Pro 12:15)). It’s kind of funny, isn’t it? It’s dumb to offer unwanted advice or opinions, but it’s wise to seek it. In this way, it’s better to receive than give. This idea of not giving unwanted advice also follows another Proverb: “Don’t waste your breath on fools, for they will despise the wisest advice.” (Pro 23:9) Now, please know I’m not saying that everyone who struggles to receive unwanted advice is a fool because quite often the main reason the advice is unwanted is the timing is terrible. Considering the more emotional we get, the dumber we become, it makes sense giving even helpful advice at the wrong time is socially dumb and pointless since the other person isn’t listening. What’s the key to a good joke? Timing. What’s the key to giving advice? Timing. What’s the key to annoying people? Asking too many questions. Is that right? Yes. Would you agree? Is that yes? Is that enough questions? Who knows?
Earlier tonight my six-year-old had a meltdown at bedtime. Knowing that heightened emotions make us dumb, is that a good time to try to tell her why her selfish demands are foolish? Absolutely… if I want to turn this bad moment into a fight. Instead, the goal is to get her in bed and to get away from her to provide space. Not only is that important for her, but also to prevent her from triggering my own anger, which is at risk when I’m tired and my patience is thin. Should I brush this bad moment off? Absolutely… if I don’t want to be a good parent and just bury my head in the sand. In the morning, after my girls are done breakfast, I’ll sit with both of my older daughters (I’ll give a pass to the two-year-old), and we’ll have a less than five-minute conversation about how to better handle these types of situations in the future. This won’t be unwanted advice (although they might think it is) or very long. Instead, I’ll simply ask several questions. First, I’ll ask if they should separate themselves by going to their room to scream in a pillow or punch their bed privately to get out their emotions or keep releasing their heightened emotions in unwanted ways in front of others? I will also ask if they’ll get anything if they demand it whether calm or in an emotionally heightened state or if their parents will be a hard no because we don’t give into terrorists… I mean kids. I know it won’t magically change their behavior, but I want to plant seeds for better options in the future while role modelling healthy communication using questions done at the right time (i.e. they need to be calm). Besides affirming their answers, I’ll avoid giving statements to prevent sounding critical or condescending. Telling people what they did was dumb makes the sharer dumb, and two dumbies doesn’t make a smartie. That’d be almost as dumb as sharing my feelings. For one, my daughters won’t care, and two, I’d be making it about me rather than their growth. If I want them to be the wise people who listen to good advice like what’s taught in Proverbs, I need to offer my wisdom in a way worth listening to.
Tip: As I teach spouses: Don’t share your “feelings”. Offer new behavior options to prevent the bad moments.
This idea of following other people’s advice does have one add-on point: We should listen to other people’s advice and opinions, but we need to filter it down to the best choice. I wish I had known this eleven years ago when my wife and I were renovating our house. We had just purchased our first home that ended up being a total gut job. Anyone who’s done renovations knows how that works. We’ll just do a little of this and a little of that, and then suddenly, “What’s happened?” Suddenly, everything is ripped out and you’re down to the studs because you need better insulation, the floors need reinforcing, and the electrical is old aluminum wiring that breaks if you bend it, which is a serious fire hazard. Every contractor knows opening walls can be a wild adventure of shock and disbelief for how stupid the previous workers were (likely homeowners who didn’t know what they were doing trying to save money). Our renovations spanned over a year and it was amazing to my wife and I how almost everyone we asked had a different opinion about how we should do things. You’d think there’d be some type of consistency to the way people thought, but no. It can be very overwhelming getting so many different opinions and leave you second guessing yourself. At one point, the one friend who was super smart with renovations was angry at me for wanting to make the basement windows bigger because he said I was setting the house up to be broken into. Coincidentally, my neighbors have iron grills over their basement windows (it’s either to prevent people from breaking in or to keep people from breaking out… I haven’t asked). Choosing to reject this one opinion was fortunately one of the best things I did in the renovation, and is regularly complimented by visitors. Yes, it’s good to listen to other people’s ideas, but we need to consider the very important question: What’s my goal? In this case, I wanted more sunlight and to help the basement feel like less of a basement. Those goals were achieved by making the windows bigger. If my goal was to make the house slightly less easy to break in, then I would’ve kept them smaller and added some prison bars like my neighbor. Fortunately, there are many other ways for someone to break into my house (although that’s probably not a “fortunately” moment).
This connects to how I spoke to my daughters in the previous example (I’m now writing after the morning talk). What was my goal? To have my daughters listen to what I had to say in hopes the message will eventually sink in. My one daughter struggles with… let’s call it “her passionate responses”. For her, I regularly quote one of my favourite Proverbs: “A gentle word reduces anger.” (para Pro 15:1a) She’ll typically follow this by asking, “Why do you always say that?” in that way that says, “I don’t care about the answer. I’m trying to make you feel small, so you’ll stop saying it.” She has the hidden message thing down like an attitude-y teenager. She’s very advanced with her tone for a six-year-old (not to brag). This might be considered unwanted advice, but I take joy in knowing it’s annoying. I’m a dad; I like being annoying, and it’s arguably better than saying, “Pull my finger.”
Trying to not be annoying, in my morning conversation with my two older girls, I went with my typical two option question approach. By giving two options, the juxtaposition helps make the answer more apparent, and by asking the question rather than giving a statement, the girls have to choose the answer rather than just rejecting me. By telling me the answer, the hope is it’ll help the message sink in while also helping them feel understood because I’m doing whatever I can to not feel like I’m talking down to them. In order to come up with the right question, I need to first start with a one sentence summary of what I want to say. If we can’t summarize our point into one sentence, we don’t know what we’re actually trying to say. If that’s the case, we need to journal or talk with a trusted friend until we can get it down to the one sentence. In this case, I had two points I wanted to make; hence, I ended up with two two-options questions.
Another way of presenting an idea is to ask someone’s opinion. I recommend this to clients all the time: (me) “If (thing) is the point you want to make, you should ask your partner a question like: ‘I heard (person they make up) say (point they want to make). Do you think that person had a good idea or missing something?” You’ll notice in my recommendation I say “a question like” because now they have the freedom to adjust the question to be more of their own whether they claim they heard it on the radio, social media, or talking to a coworker. Even in my position as someone people pay to ask for help I try to role model healthy ways to share ideas. Another option is to simply ask: “Can I make a suggestion?” At least you’re giving the other person permission to say no to your advice while setting them up to be ready to listen to you.
On top of timing and how we present our advice, if we want to set the other person up to hear what we have to say, we should try to live in a way that makes us worthy of giving advice. Will you hire a dentist who doesn’t have any teeth? Should you hire a 400-pound, donut loving personal trainer? Should you hire a therapist/officiant having an affair on his live-in girlfriend he had originally cheated on his ex-wife with? (That was oddly specific because I found out the colleague who signed my marriage license did this – ouch). Years ago, my sister needed to have a scar removed. She told me her choice of a plastic surgeon was based on how attractive the doctor was because my sister wanted someone to understand the importance of vanity. I ended up hiring this same doctor to remove several cists – she was great. My sister made a good choice, and I made a good choice by following her advice. It was easy for me, however, because she’s someone worthy of giving advice.
Tip: I was once told people are either a Maximizer or Satisficer. Maximizer’s try to maximize their decisions – the title makes sense. They do exhaustive research before making a decision. The downside is they can struggle with second guessing themselves since they’ll often wonder if they missed an important point. Meanwhile, Satisficers just want good enough. This can mean they don’t make the best decision, but they’re more likely to be happy with their decision. I tend to be a Satisficer who tries to find the Maximizer to do all the work for me… you know, like a leach. When you’re a work-aholic, however, you have to find ways to save time to do all the other things on your to-do list. I scored hard having a sister who’s a Maximizer and she scored hard… in some other way… I’m sure there’s some way.
If someone isn’t giving advice in the way that you can hear it, you’ll want to consider how to best convey this to them. My suggestion is to make a request starting with the question: Can I make a request? After being affirmed you can make the request: “In order to help me hear your advice better, can you please do what I just did and ask if you can give a request instead of just telling me what to do?” Remember it’s better to offer a solution to the problem than to share your feelings or complain.
This week may you consider how you can accept other people’s advice and share your own in a way that people will more likely appreciate.
Rev. Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people (like me)
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