We waste most of the advice we receive. I give way too much advice and I see it wasted all the time, it’s still worth it to me to give it because of that little bit that takes effect. Here’s how I see it wasted and here’s how to prevent wasting what we receive.
Good advice that’s absorbed and used is rare. It has to have perfect timing, and a bunch of other factors to make it work. Here are some problems with good advice.
- It might be good for the speaker but not the recipient.
- It can be too big. Sometimes the advice that’s really most crucial to our change is something we can’t handle and that’s why we’re where we are. Not ready to make a huge change.
- The timing might be off
- We might not trust the speaker or think the speaker has not heard us
- The advice came unsolicited, so was taken as criticism
- We can’t even wrap our brains around the concept because we’re so far away from that mindset
- We don’t follow through
- The advice came as an answer to a different question than we asked because the speaker felt we asked the wrong question
Here are some symptoms we’re poorly receiving advice
- We’re annoyed
- We feel misunderstood
- The advice triggers a very low frequency emotional response. It sounds boring, or mundane, or a little weird — not awful, but not life changing like we want.
- We get really excited about it and think it’s life changing
- We forget it
Best trick for absorbing is following up.
If it’s appropriate, we can tell the advisor that we will follow up with them on it. We don’t have to say we’ll take the advice, but that maybe we’ll look into it and get back to them. Thank them. All this stuff is powerful. It adds accountability, it adds an expression of gratitude, it adds a commitment to remember the advice. If I have to follow up with a person later, I’m going to really take in the advice and it will mean something to me.
When we follow up, it has a side effect of motivating the advisor. People like giving advice that’s useful. If I give you advice that helps you achieve your goals, heck yes I’ll give you more advice in the future. That’s fun!
More tricks to being advice sticky
- write it down
- discuss it with someone we trust
- plan an action for it. If someone says “you need to talk to my accountant.” Get the phone number and schedule calling the accountant next week if it’s too scary to do tomorrow.
- ask someone else to be an accountability buddy on it
- sit with it. Imagine taking the advice. Feel what that feels like. Basically, visualize
- research it, but don’t let the research become an escape