If someone is not asking for my advice it usually means they don't want to hear it. Sounds obvious right? I am still amazed at how many times I have to wrestle this problem to the ground. I continually catch myself trying to offer free advice that was not solicited. Offering unsolicited advice can quickly transform you into a persona non grata without warning. The dilemma is that I'm a terminal problem solver and a recovering mister fix it.
It's difficult to apply the necessary filter to my affliction because it's a personal blind spot. It becomes especially troubling raising two teenagers that require an objective listening ear not advice. Advice giving is one of the fastest ways to shut down communication. The second best way is dropping a cup of hot coffee in someone's lap.
I have come to accept when people are bent on doing something be it sane or insane, they are happy to recite their scheme to me with great enthusiasm. This discourse is designed specifically to rally support in favor of their scheme not to endure sound advice from someone with more experience trying to talk them out of it. Move over dream killer there's a new optimist in town.
The older I get the safer I require my risks to be. Eventually they become calculated risks or no risk at all. I've become far less dumb over time and desire to spare my friends and family the disaster of failure. I have had to ask myself why. We learn our greatest lessons through failure. Why spare them from a perfectly timed life lesson? Why keep them from making an error that is not life threatening? It may even result in being a life changing lesson, how do I know.
The saying that's life is a phrase that helps us accept that things are not always going to go our way. There are seasons when we are flying high and other seasons when we are dumped down low. Who am I to jump in the path of life's quality lessons? I want to learn to be more like Frank Sinatra and just offer those two words that make daily living tolerable after the big stumble, tumble and fall? That's life
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