Been telling instead of teaching?
Hearing instead of listening?
Condemning instead of understanding?
Misinterpreting certainty for self-confidence?
Me? Guilty.
I’ve always thought the best teachers were the ones who were most understood. I love to teach, I love to share wisdom, I love being a parent.
But I have to watch it. Sometimes I talk AT people instead of teaching people, act ALL KNOWING instead of wise, and GIVE ADVICE to my children instead of actually listening to the problem they have, and letting them know I understand.
Advice is tricky. It usually comes off as “telling” someone what to do. And I should know better — as much as anyone I know, I don’t like being told what to do.
A couple of problems with advice is that:
- It doesn’t let the person who’s seeking direction OWN the answer and the solution as theirs. Instead of “leading the asker to the answer themselves,” then “leave the truth in the asker’s kitchen,” advice can often and rather condescend the one looking for it.
- Advice alienates the one seeking it — making them feel like they’re the ONLY ones in the world with that particular “problem,” which is rarely true.
When we feel our problem is understood, that we’re NOT the ONLY one with it, we’re able to exhale, and understand for the first time that OUR problem is NOT solely original to US — that OUR problem is a HUMAN one, that people have struggled with BEFORE us and will AFTER. There is a grace in this realization that allows the one who is lost to find their way again. Knowing we’re not the only one takes the pressure off and allows us to do what we need to do to heal — seeing ourselves in others and being seen by others allows us to see ourselves as members of the Family of Man.
And that’s the mid-week memo.
By Matthew McConaughey