Receiving Advice

When you get advice, you are asking what that person would do if they were in your situation. That person is not you, and only knows what you have told them, in the way they have understood it. Once you have heard the advice, you can filter it for the bits of information that make sense to you in your world. 

A danger in giving advice, arises with the expectation that it will be implemented. That is not advice. That is an instruction. It is true that if there is no evidence that the advice has any impact, the person giving the feedback is unlikely to continue giving it. If the recipient does not seem open to it. If they are feigning interest without genuine listening or learning. There is a dance going on. 

There needs to be real curiosity, but also an acceptance that advice is autobiographical and projects experiences onto someone else. Not everything is going to land. There still needs to be clarity about whose decision it is. Otherwise, you get into a situation where responsibility does not walk hand in hand with authority. 

Similarly, when advice is being given... it is not a debate. The person listening doesn’t have to defend themselves. There may be clarity needed, or additional context required, but you don’t have to convince the advice-giver to act in the way the decision-maker would.

Oculus hoc est (1619)