Former hostage negotiator Chris Voss says to never accept advice from somebody you wouldn’t trade places with. That has made me reconsider who to accept advice from and also stop paying attention to what most other folks want me to do, whether I know them in person or have heard their advice through various self-help platforms. There are countless people trying to fix the whole world when they can’t even fix their own lives. They have huge personal problems that they can’t seem to solve and yet they think they have the solutions to nearly every problem under the sun. Along with this, they spend so much time talking about their ideas and so little time actually doing anything with them. Most of what they do is to ask or demand that those in positions of power solve problems rather than seeing what they can directly do to help themselves, those close to them, and maybe even those far away from them. As a result, nothing gets done, their frustration mounts, and they have a lot less energy and other resources to spend fixing the problems in their own backyards.
The odd thing is that if more people would focus on the things in their own lives that they can actually control, they would quickly see improvements for themselves and their families. Over time, the improvements would spread throughout their neighborhoods, cities, countries, and, ultimately, the world. By ignoring what they can control and focusing so much on what they can’t control, their lives either stay the same or, more likely, get worse. Just as planting a garden and letting butterflies arrive on their own is much more likely to succeed than chasing butterflies, this is a case of getting what you want by going for something else and not getting it if you go straight at it.
Realizing how much trouble I have with keeping my own life in check has made me back way away from giving advice. Some exceptions to this are when someone asks me for help with something I know well (such as juggling and related activities or personal struggles I’ve overcome) and sharing what’s worked well for me through this blog. Outside of that, I almost never give advice at this point. Even when I do, I’ll wait until someone asks me rather than give my unsolicited opinions, and I’ll always add a caveat when I’m unsure or have trouble explaining what’s helped me.
Instead of giving advice, I’m much more focused now on using practical tools to improve my own life. Whether I’ve found a particular tool myself or learned it from someone else, the stuff that’s worked has really worked. At least when I’ve applied it to problems that are within my control. I’d rather solve one small problem this way than fail to solve ten big problems that are beyond my control. So far, so good.
This is exactly what Stephen Covey talks about in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People with regard to focusing on one’s circles of influence and control rather than spending all of one’s time in the circle of concern. Focusing just on what I can control has greatly reduced my stress, allowed me to recover almost completely from my dog Sawyer’s death, and kept me out of a lot of trouble by preventing me from getting mixed up with individuals or organizations that claim to want to do good things while their actions actually end up making the world worse. Deep down, I wish everyone would do this so that we could all benefit from the much better world that would follow and stop being hurt by the awful things that happen when people try to influence things over which they have no control. Since I have no control over that, though, I’ve given up trying to make it happen. As long as things keep moving in good directions for me and those close to me, I’ll feel satisfied.