Let me give you some advice!
Advice! It’s everywhere. Unavoidable in this Age of Information, avoidable only if you follow Thoreau into the woods to ”live deliberately”, which perhaps is not advice but something else even more powerful.
One area of life where advice comes up most frequently is in the self-help culture, where gurus abound offering the keys, steps, and secrets to ultimate success. From Frederick Taylor, to Dale Carnegie, to Werner Erhard, to Tony Robbins, we’ve been at this for over a century.
This makes me wonder why people who are driven to help themselves need so many gurus. Are they trying to be ironic?
So I’d like to offer my critical perspective on this culture of self help. But I don’t like to ruin peoples fun. If you want to go to a seminar for that kick of motivation, go ahead. In fact, I still dabble in that world, and find many gems of wisdom in it.
But I have a deep sense that there are dangers to the self-help industry. The core of this danger is that it can breed a dependence on external signals for answers that can only be derived by looking inward. It compels us to outsource the calibration of our own compasses to the gurus and their followers. But isn’t this calibration a deeply personal exercise, closer to something like prayer? By prayer I don’t necessarily mean praying to a God, but a deep reflection on the mysteries of your own experience to search for guidance in your process of becoming.
And such a practice is more important than ever, because the storm of stimuli in our modern world can make it harder and harder to find your true north.
In this Age of Information, with Tik Tok and Facebook and Twitter and Instagram (not to mention the naughty sites) this storm of stimuli can be overwhelming. The problem is that the overwhelm is curated in such a way that we enjoy it. We pull it on our own heads. We have come to enjoy our overwhelm, even to the extent of being addicted by it. But what it’s overwhelming is our own natural ability to calibrate our own compass. So, instead of paying attention to our own energy systems and how it responds to the challenges of life, we outsource the process to gurus and all their success formulas.
I’m all for shortcuts, but not if they bypass necessary parts of the process? Taking ownership of your life is complicated. Figuring it out can sometimes seem impossible. So, instead of paying attention to our own particular challenges and attuning to the still small voice within, we look to the maelstrom of signals out there. We scroll through social media for the quick hits of wisdom provided by endless streams of inspirational quotes.
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.”
That’s fine, but of no use if you don’t take that one step.
“Life is too short to wake up with regrets.”
That’s fine, but what if you wake up with regrets. What if they need to be worked through?
I can do this all day long. Sure, these inspirational quotes, life hacks, and success formulas aren’t without value, but they don’t serve us well if used as a substitute for the real work of deep reflection.
The net result of this phenomenon seems to be that everyone is pretending to be Confucius, when really everyone is just confused.
And it is from that state of unacknowledged confusion that many of us offer our advice. We pose as a director in some grand play, presuming to know the magic choice another must make to further their life. But we cannot fully know what it’s like to live in another persons shoes, nor know what ideal next step they should take.
The vital practice of self-reflection is relegated to a constant montage of other-reflected wisdoms, placating our sense that we are wise. It’s a kind of McSpirituality.
The self-help industry has been placating this need for decades. Think of all the books on self improvement. Authors offering some Enumerated formula promising the keys for anything you want in life. The 7-steps to this and the 9-keys to that, the secret to everything they don’t want you to know! Try this. Google ‘STEPS TO SUCCESS’ and you will find a maddening selection of books and formulas with different numbers of different steps to success. Doesn’t that strike you odd?
Why are there so many steps and so many books? Why are they constantly coming out? Why do different formulas have different numbers of different steps? If any one of these books and the success formula therein had the real secret steps to success, wouldn’t one be enough? Unless the real secret to success is to write a book on the secret steps to success, to sell people the idea that they have the magic formula, and get rich in the process.
The truth is that there is no formula. Life is messy. Each of us is an entirely unique being in this world with entirely unique sets of problems. That’s not to say there is no value in hearing another persons perspective, but that’s all it is - a perspective. But you have one too, and maybe it’s time you flesh that out, with a practice of introspection supported by good faith conversations with people worthy of that trust. You know, talking to each other.
For about a year now I’ve gone on what I call an “advice fast”. That is, I asked my self how I would relate to other people if I stopped giving them advice. What other tool would I have at my disposal if people came to me for guidance.
I’ll illustrate my argument by ironically breaking my fast.
Stop giving advice, and start sharing epiphanies.
Epiphanies are not prescriptive, they are descriptive. They illustrate for others all the richness and color of those rare moments in our lives when a miracle happened, when we experienced a radical shift in our consciousness. This mode of relating doesn't require a bullhorn, but a paintbrush, one that vividly paints a picture of that moment when your consciousness shifted.
Contrast that with advice. Typically, the giver has assumed a position of power over the other. For that moment, they can indulge their intuitions and offer some experimental strategy, using the receiver as the pawn in their intuitive experiment.
“Just tell him to get lost!”
“Just join a meditation class.”
“Just eat more blueberries.”
But how do you know that’s what they need? Aren’t you just encouraging the other to adopt a strategy that may have worked for you, and offering it in part to bolster your own social capital?
Maybe it worked for you because it just so happened to be what YOU needed at the time. Whereas you got divorced, maybe they need to reconcile their marriage. Meditation worked for you, but maybe meditation would be an avoidance of the trauma work they need to do. Maybe they need strawberries.
For me, I would only feel comfortable giving advice if I knew I was all loving, all knowing, and all powerful. There’s only one person I know to have those attributes, and I’m still not certain She exists.
Take this small thought experiment. I invite you to one of two parties tonight. At one party, everyone gives advice. At the other party, everyone shares epiphanies. Which one would you attend?
So why are there so many gurus? What do they all have different magic formulas for life? Could it be because people are desperate for some map, some sense of certainty in a life that is fundamentally uncertain? And could it be that the supplier gets a hit of significance and social capital by supplying it?
I find it far more healthy to face the uncertainty, and do what I can to create some sense of design and flow in my own life. But once I generate that flow, I can share that energy with others. I do this not through giving advice, which invariably triggers my narcissistic tendency to show that I have the answer. No, I can listen to the person intently, search my experience for resonant similarities, and share any shifts in my own consciousness with respect to that issue. This is not a position of superiority, but a position of vulnerability, thoughts from a humble traveler also going through their messy journey.
That’s the energy of epiphanies, they are moments of transformation where life compelled you to do the impossible, to change.
Since making this shift in consciousness for myself, I find that I don’t need to do away with the insights of the gurus; they are human too. I don’t need to burn the self help books, or success formulas, or life hacks. I just relate to those things from a healthier place, not as a junky fiending for another hit of magic wisdom, but as an artist participating in the ongoing mosaic of human understanding.
So maybe the advise to “stop giving advice“ is itself unwarranted. After all, I’m quite certain it, along with the preponderance of advice exchanged every day through ever expanding channels, will certainly be rejected. But the miracle of epiphanies is such that I alone can be enriched by them without needing others to have those same ones. I can live my life embodying their wisdom, and do my best to share the richness of their impact.
A simple way to say this is that advice, even when woven in high-minded books, success formulas, inspirational quotes, and life hacks, contains an energy of righteousness, while epiphanies contains an energy of transformation.
Take a hint from Thoreau, he didn’t give advice so much as share his epiphanies from a genuine immersion in his choice to “live deliberately.” In the woods, he gathered and his shared epiphanies, and all those who listened are richer for it.
He had his epiphanies, I have mine, and I can’t wait to hear yours.
Mike Greca
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