In these crazy times, I catch myself… not even understanding myself. How can you give advice to others when you do not always understand your own situation? Maybe by stopping pretending to have all the answers. For a long time, I thought advice had to be firm. Certain. Like: Here’s what you need to do.
These days, I increasingly think the opposite. The most honest advice isn’t the kind that sounds clever. It’s the kind that acknowledges its limits. You don’t have to have all the answers to be helpful. It’s enough to be honest. Instead of “Do it this way,” it might be more valuable to say, “I’ve been through something similar, and this is what worked for me… but see what makes sense for you.”
Advice isn’t about controlling someone else’s path; it’s about offering a perspective. The problem arises when people are looking for certainty, and you give them the illusion of certainty. But the reality is different: No single experience gives us a complete picture of someone else’s situation. And maybe that’s exactly what “being smart” means today…
It means not acting like you know everything, but sharing what you do know without insisting it be absolute.
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