Tips on Advice

From the time we're old enough to understand the meaning of words, we're getting advice. Sometimes we get advice because we’ve asked for it, but a lot of times we just get it because people think we should hear it. Maybe that’s why advice often becomes an excuse for the wrong decision: "I was only acting on advice."

But advice can be very useful if you know how to separate the good advice from the other kinds. Here are a few observations on advice. We advise you to keep them in mind next time you ask someone else's opinion. Or for that matter, next time someone asks you for your opinion.

One thing's for sure: asking the advice of people your own age, who are sharing essentially the same life experiences, has its limitations. Our first advice on asking for advice is to have lots of advisors from different walks of life and different age groups. Don't always go to people who are just like you, because they may not be able to give you any more knowledge or perspective than you already have. Good advice often comes from strange places, and an outside opinion can make you consider things you might not have thought of.

Experience is impossible to avoid. Every minute, hour and day of your life, you experience something. All of that experience adds up to a very personal idea of what it’s all about and what’s best to do. And the more we experience, the more we feel like we should pass our experiences along as advice. Middle-aged people are the motherlode of advice. They're just dying to lay down what they've learned. To many people, advice is both prevention and cure: they believe it’s the way to keep kids out of trouble and on track.

Older people, on the other hand, have seen too much over too long to believe that any advice will work for anyone. Grandparents and other gurus tend to pass along their advice with a "take it or leave it, I'll understand" attitude. They'd like to help, certainly, but only you can decide if they're able to, or if what they have to offer is worth adding to the mix.

It all goes back to the idea of accepting different advice from different people. And don't rule out advice from books, magazine articles or even movies (not so much from reality TV, though).

So far we've been going on about you asking for advice, but what about when someone hits you up for advice? When that happens, you might want to keep a few things in mind:

• Understand that while the person asking for advice apparently respects your opinion, they're not you. And be prepared to be surprised by what they do with your advice (including ignoring it), without being offended.
  
  
• Don't try to second-guess yourself into the other person's shoes. You simply can't. Offer your opinion more in terms of "Here’s what I'd do" than "Here’s what you should do."
  
  
• Remember that you're probably (and hopefully) not the only person they're asking for advice.

• All advice counts, as long as it's not the only advice you ask for. Get advice from everyone. And especially people from every generation. 
  
  
• Know something about the people you're asking for advice. Something good, something bad, it really doesn't matter. You just need something that will give you a perspective on what they say.
  
  
• Don't let advice make up your mind. Taking advice is about letting other people help you fine-tune your own thinking, not about letting them think for you. You are responsible for your own decisions.