Selectively Taking Advice
When asking for help
Asking for help is a good thing. You should be proud to ask for help. You’re not weaker if you do and you’re not stronger if you don’t.
The biggest struggle I face when asking for help is taking advice without further consideration.
It seems silly to think that whenever someone offers their opinion I don’t question it. And while this doesn’t happen often, it happens a lot, particularly when the opinion is related to new territory for me. When I’m in unknown waters, I’m not as confident. Therefore, I’m more susceptible to accepting ideas with less scrutiny and this is dangerous.
When it comes to design, selectively acting on feedback is more innate because I’m already aware that the process can be very subjective. Instead of acting on every suggested tweak or idea, I put it through my own microscope and decide if the suggestion will improve the overall direction or just make one person happy.
When it comes to other areas where I have less experience, I’m pretty quick to act on the first idea someone gives me because I won’t have any past experience to convince me otherwise. While this is a valid reaction, it’s not always the right reaction.
So how do you get better at selectively taking advice?
Never take advice without further consideration. Never take advice without fully understanding the scope of the suggestion. Never take advice without doing your own research. Never take advice without asking why. Why would it benefit you to act upon the recommendation? Never take advice if you don’t trust the person giving it. Never take advice if it doesn’t feel right. Never take advice without knowing what you want for yourself.
But do consider taking advice to make your own informed opinion. You should feel empowered to move forward after getting help not more distressed.
Happy Friday!
– Kim Goulbourne aka “Bourn”
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Kim aka”Bourn” is a chronic creator, designer and coder. Curator of Hashtags Unplugged and creator behind electionrewind.com, bitterrenter.nyc, foundermantras.com, sendthanks.to and hshtags.com.
