Every thought about giving and taking advice I’ve ever had
guzey.com
guzey.com
- the best advice, in most domains, is never given freely or publicly, so if you are seeking advice, seek it in private
- the best advice tends to have pain associated with it for the recipient (Alexey notes this in section 4)
- the best advice-givers are aware of the effect that giving their advice would have on a typical recipient
- the best advice-givers will tell white-lies privately, even to people they love and respect, if the advice-seekers don't send ultra-clear ultra-proactive signals that they will not be hurt by the advice they seek
- the best advice tends to give you a new "lens" or "perspective" through which to view the world, unlocking second- and third-order insights of your own
- sometimes you really have made a mess of things, and no amount of "advice" can save you from the necessary task of working through all that mess
This is all the same thought, just expressed 6 different ways.
I think I tried to communicate this when suggesting asking for outrageous advice, but I think you're making this point better. Anyway, I added you comment to https://guzey.com/advice/#best-comments :)
"What are you not saying because you're scared I'll blame you if it fails" implies that the advice-giver has a certain mental model that didn't quite resonate with me.
Mostly I try to avoid hurting people who ask me for advice. A) because I care about them, and B) because very often the "right" answer could reduce their will-to-action in a completely counter-productive way.
(As a hypothetical relevant to HN -- 9 times out of 10, the "correct" advice to give your friend on their startup/product is to deliver a completely filter-free structured rant about all the ways their startup/product is complete and utter dogshit. "Correct" in the sense that their startup/product will be bad and need iteration, but also in the sense that founders/creators almost always have a Parent-Child-esque emotional connection to their creation, and without some external emotive-"knock" they will often rationalize away the need to make changes.
But of course that is incredibly poor form as a friend, which is your foremost relationship with this person, and not as a product-reviewer! And so you'll tend to give some nice comments and then some highly-couched "constructive" critique that signals you know they want some negative feedback, but don't trust them to handle it -- and as a result they won't really know where their product stands, and nothing improves.
As a prospective advice-seeker, you really can't over-signal your commitment to getting the other person's raw & emotional thoughts. "Swear" words tend to be one good way to signal this sort of thing in the English-speaking professional environment, but ultimately humans evolved to be master-tier readers of their friends' inner emotional state and if you feel a tightening in your gut when you get harsh advice, the advice-giver knows you feel it)
But see it's more complicated than that.
I would say it's way more likely that the best advice you could give someone working on a new startup or product is to to convince them to stop being so negative and stop thinking everything they're doing is dogshit and to summon the self-confidence and charisma that comes from really believing in what you're doing, since that tends to have self-fulfilling effects.
Unless, of course, the person has delusional self-regard already, and are more likely to make the opposite mistake.
One reason why giving advice is so challenging is that it's always extremely context-driven.
:) exactly!
I’ve started to think of advice as a moral dilemma. Someone asks a simple question and I start thinking, “oh god, what is gonna happen if I start mouthing off right now?”
Over the past few weeks I’ve had people tell me that thanks to my advice, they have either decided to continue trying to work on a problem (that they were going to give up on), or the reverse. I think this happens by accident when you are a subject matter expert in a field—no matter how narrow that field is, no matter how little of an expert you are, you know that 1) you can push someone new to the field in almost any direction you want, and 2) if you don’t push someone in a direction on purpose, you or someone else will just push them in a direction by accident.
That, and when you want advice you are rarely able to formulate the question correctly. Like if someone asks, “Can I do this?” the literal answer is, far too often, “Yes, but let’s have a discussion about whether you want to do that.”
That said...I can remember phrases that my parents said in passing that for whatever reason stuck deep in me that I carry to this day, while doubtless advice they gave countless times I have no recollection of.
So, the stakes are extremely high, but the variance is also so high that it’s important not to let it paralyze you.
I don't want to believe this is entirely true. I want to outgrow the coping mechanisms my upbringing forced me to learn in order to adapt, which are now actively harming me. If some things we impart on children truly are irreversible, then it's as if I'm trapped consciously aware of how my parents influenced my life and still there isn't enough I can do to move on. And I didn't choose my parents, so I could not consent to being raised in the ways they chose.
Optimistically, perhaps by overcoming the things that currently hold you back, you will later have greater insights and advantages from having to have had to rework that part of yourself.
Paper in infinitely flexible and cheap. I use tablets along with paper, but they are too expensive for note taking.
Unless you are a programmer, do not use things like roam research. It is too complex and too rigid.
If you want to create a new habit, it must be very simple and unsophisticated. Over time you will complicate things, but first you need to get used to the simple thing.
It is better to do something simple today that trying to do something so complex and perfect you never do.
I scan my papers with an automatic feeder scanner. I digitalize the strokes. I have a library that I can access remotely, but I started simple.
About the personalities, you can study this stuff, so you can identify fast if someone is agreeable or disagreeable, extrovert, introvert, sensory... if you have a company, it has an enormous utility.
Care to expand? I've only used Roam a bit, but when I did, I pretty much just typed directly into the daily note and that was it. Roam is more for thinking and connecting ideas is my understanding. Programmers typically keep notes for future reference.
Of course your mileage may vary, but even with an abundance of digital tools I personally find that I prefer to always keep a notepad and pen handy. Leaving the screen helps too.
You ask advice: ah, what a very human and very dangerous thing to do! For to give advice to a man who asks what to do with his life implies something very close to egomania. To presume to point a man to the right and ultimate goal— to point with a trembling finger in the RIGHT direction is something only a fool would take upon himself.
I am not a fool, but I respect your sincerity in asking my advice. I ask you though, in listening to what I say, to remember that all advice can only be a product of the man who gives it. What is truth to one may be disaster to another. I do not see life through your eyes, nor you through mine. If I were to attempt to give you specific advice, it would be too much like the blind leading the blind.
Being advisor is dangerous because you can become entangled in the matter you have no power to decide on. I make sure that people understand managing the issue and advising on it are two completely separate roles. It usually is a chat in the form: If you want, cede the power to make decisions and only then I can try my best to resolve it and be responsible for results.
When it comes to somebody's life, it is not possible to cede the responsibility and so by very definition it is just not possible for me to take any responsibility for the advice I give and it is still up to the person to decide whether they can trust the advice and how to use it.
But this is actually an excellent and original post. The part about how to take advice is esp. insightful. Very interesting. So thanks for this.
This is on Firefox 82.0.3 (64-bit), although possibly worth noting it's the Linux Mint version from their repo rather than the generic version. Linux Mint 20, FWIW.
The margin-left calculation on the toc class puts it outside of view.
I think this can be solved by setting position: fixed and margin-left: 10px in a media query for bigger screens.
Note that my screen is 1920 pixels wide, and the switchover between the two behaviors seems to occur at around 1820 pixels. Narrower than that and it works fine, wider than that and it breaks.
Update: fixed this. Thank you!
1. You can give 'good' advice or 'bad' advice 2. Your advice can be followed, or ignored
There are thus four outcomes:
i. You give good advice and they follow it. They will most likely internalise the merit of the advice and not really give you any credit, but no praise is the best possible outcome.
ii. You give good advice and they ignore it. They resent you for giving them good advice that they ignored.
iii. You give bad advice and they follow it. They resent you (and blame you) for the outcome.
iv. You give bad advice and they ignore it. They dismiss you as an idiot.
Edit: This means that people may know that smoking is bad for them, but they will need to live it for themselves to truly accept it. Most advice my parents gave me was very good, but I did not follow it because I wanted the freedom to make my own choices. Many years later I ended up arriving at the same conclusions they suggested on my own. I ended up wasting time, but I was more comfortable accepting their advice as good.
0: https://kitemaker.co - an issue tracker for modern agile teams
The narrative between chapters is excruciating, but the content should be useful for anyone looking to mentor others, or getting a mentor.
One of my key takeaways is that how advice is delivered is as important or more than the advice itself.
[1] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tao-Coaching-Effectiveness-Inspirin...
A question for OP: who are the best advice givers we can learn from in your view?
Everything this author is saying about advice seems to hinge in the misunderstanding of the real value of advice. He mistakenly believes advice quality is directly correlated to proven outcomes for the listener. That model will never work.
In fact, trying to give someone advice on a subject will almost certainly make it impossible for that person to ever change.
Even more important, you are intentionally giving advice. If someone notices you lost weight and you talk about the new diet you are trying. Even though you never actually say someone should try the diet, they are taking it as if you are trying to give them advice.
The best advice someone can give you, never give any advice or tell anyone about anything. Ask other people about things you might learn from them and try it.