Earlier this week I was chatting with one of my friends over the phone, during our monthly scheduled catch-up meetings. Why yes, I did send her a recurring calendar invite to make sure it was on both of our radars.. why do you ask?
A-Type personality aside, it’s a ‘meeting’ I look forward to and thoroughly enjoy - we talk about things going on in our lives, goals, and what books we’re reading. It’s an overall positive conversation, but also a great chance to vent if the need arises.
Halfway through the conversation, I was complaining about something very mundane, and I was just stuck on this minor inconvenience. It felt as though this small hurdle was spiraling into all the other aspects of my life and weighing me down.
My friend dutifully listened, and then asked me “Well, is this going to matter in six months?”
To which I responded that of course it wouldn’t, it would be resolved one way or another by then and there was nothing I could do to sway the outcome either way.
She then pragmatically said “Ok, then don’t worry about it.”
My response: “Wow, that’s really good advice.”
Her response: “Monica, it’s from YOUR NEWSLETTER!”
Well, well, well, well, well.
If it isn’t the consequences of my own actions.
And I wish I could tell you this is the first time it’s happened, but no, repeatedly, people have been giving my own advice back to me. Which brings us to the topic this week:
Why is it so easy to give advice, and so hard to take your own?
Advice Is Easier at a Distance
When someone else tells you what’s going on in their life, the solution usually feels obvious. You can see the scale of the problem, you’re able to filter what matters and what doesn’t, and you can process the data using rational thought.
But when it’s your situation?
Everything suddenly feels urgent and complicated and emotionally significant
If a friend told me:
“This is stressing me out but it won’t matter in six months.”
I would immediately say:
“Then let it go.”
If I say:
“This won’t matter in six months.”
My brain says:
“Yes, but it seems really important now. And hey, we’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this already. Are you sure we want to stop worrying? Maybe, we could just keep worrying about this, and maybe up the ante even more!”
It’s a very different energy.
Sometimes You Already Know the Answer
A lot of the time, the advice I need is not new advice. It’s something I already wrote down, or already said to someone else. It’s something I recognize from a book, a talk I attended or even a TV show I watched. As much as we want to believe we are all unique individuals, our problems are usually pretty mundane, and have been experienced by other people (or even ourselves) before.
The difference is that I write these newsletters on Fridays (draft #1) and edit on Mondays (draft #2) and these are two of the most intentionally calm, meeting free days of my week. On those days, I have more perspective.
My call with my friend was on a Wednesday, and by then I was stressed about client deliverables and in between meetings, in a much more emotional, reactive state of mind.
So there are two different Monicas, and even though one may know the answer, she might not be the Monica I’m working with at that moment.
The trick is finding a way to get back to that calm, rational version when I need to.
Try This the Next Time Something Feels Big
The next time something is bothering you, try asking yourself:
Would I tell a friend to worry about this?
Will this matter in six months?
Am I reacting or responding?
What advice would I give someone else in this situation?
And then, of course, the uncomfortable next step:
Take that advice.
Because sometimes the calmest, clearest version of you has already solved the problem.
You just have to listen to them.
