I've got some ideas for you today about unsolicited
advice. The surprising cousin to criticism.
unsolicited advice. This is actually kind of hilarious when you think about it because
everybody loves to give it and hates to get it. Why is this the case?
I think there's a few reasons for that. Number 1,
we know we're right. Think about it. It's not that we think
we're right. We know we're right. And so whatever it is that
we're thinking becomes the truth of life the universe and
everything. That's the first problem. The second
reason why we give unsolicited advice is really out of our
heart. It's out of a genuine caring for other
people. We do care about them. We love them we want their life to be
better. And so of course, we need to fill them in with what the truth is.
And that's whatever we think it is. That's the second reason why we all want
to give unsolicited advice. And the third reason is a little
selfish but i think you might relate to this.
We really insist secretly at some level that the world would operate according
to our own expectations and desires. We really want
things to go the way we want them to go. And if it's not going
that way, we think something's wrong and we have
to intervene. So, these 3 reasons have us all
wanting to give unsolicited advice. But who really wants unsolicited advice?
Anybody you know? No. People don't want it, you don't want it.
So, what are we doing with this whole unsolicited advice thing? You know, I have
a friend who is a brilliant hall of fame
speaker. And when he was giving a keynote recently at a big event that was full of
influencers and other speakers, he killed it. He did such a great job on the
stage. And right afterwards, several people from the audience also
professional speakers but none of whom were hall of fame
speakers like my friend came up to him to offer their
advice about how he could improve his presentation. How would you feel
in that circumstance? Have you ever been in that circumstance? Think about that
for a minute and the human effect that it has
when we're offering unsolicited advice. Now, in the title I called this the
surprising cousin to criticism. We don't always see it as criticism
because, well we're coming from the goodness of our own
heart. We know that we're right. And we really think that the world would be
better if it aligned with our way of seeing
things. Even if it's positive,
it comes across to others as being criticism. Because at some level, it's
saying, "Hey, however you figured out to do this isn't
as good as the way I've figured out to do this.
You must not be as bright as me. Let me see if I can fill you
in on some ways to be awesome and bright like me."
See? And that comes across this criticism because
now people are feeling less than. It's like i pat you on the head and say,
"Oh, I approve of what you're doing" or "Here's some things you could do better"
It's like I'm here and you're here. What gives me the authority to approve or
disapprove of you in the first place? That sets up the discrepancy. And that's
why people are feeling criticized. Let me share with you a model that will
help us to understand how this works. In this quadrant system
that I'm showing you right now, there are 2 dimensions that overlap.
It has to do with feelings and content of where our focus is.
You can see in the upper left quadrant, my focus is on how I feel about me.
That one I've colored red. On the upper right
quadrant it's how you feel about me. I've colored that one orange. On the
lower left quadrant, it's how I feel about
you. That one's purple. And then finally in the green quadrant there on
the lower right how you feel about you. When you look at each
of these in order, let's look at the first one. The
red quadrant, how I feel about me. The problem when we
get into this is called self-consciousness. And I'm not
talking about a healthy sense of self-awareness.
I'm talking about that anxious Oh-my--gosh-am-I-good-enough
kind of a focus. Notice the anxiety that that brings up.
Let's move over to orange. In this quadrant, my focus is on how
you feel about me. Do you like me? Do you think I'm good enough? Smart
enough, cute enough? Do I fit in with you and your group?
Welcome back to junior high people where we're trying to see how we fit in all
the time. This creates insecurity.
Notice. Now, whether it's red or orange, we have the same
problem --anxiety. This creates anxiety.
Notice it. Now, let's move down to the purple for a minute.
Now, my focus is on how I feel about you. How I feel about you.
This is where parents get stuck all the time. Because we're constantly as parents
focused on how we feel about our children and their choices.
This is purple and the pitfall here is criticism. This is why I
said that unsolicited advice is the surprising cousin to criticism.
Because it's in this purple quadrant. Notice it. Even if it's positive, it comes
across as criticism. Whether it's red or
purple, we run into the same problem and it's called judgment.
It's either that anxious self-judgment of the red
or it's that critical coming across giving the unsolicited advice of the
purple. Either way it's a judgment problem.
So, let's go green, shall we? Because this is part of the solution that i wanted to
share with you. When we go green, my focus is no longer
about me. How I feel is only secondary. My focus is
now on how you feel about yourself.
And this is powerful because it shifts all of the energy in a way that allows
us to have influence. That's why I call this the
influence quadrant. When you look at the entire model, you'll
see that where our focus is matters.
And this becomes part of our solution. In sharing with you the influence
quadrant, I know that was a quick overview.
But you can get a complete overview of this if you get into the positivity
power up course. I spend some time there fleshing it out
for you so that you can see it more completely.
And I'll tell you at the end of the video how you can get to that.
The reason i shared this with you is because the
purple quadrant that I shared is where people feel criticized.
And when our focus is on how we feel about them, we are likely to give them
unsolicited advice. I want to refer back to something I
heard from one of my podcast guests. Rick De Bruyle is a communications
specialist. He's been a broadcaster for ESPN for a lot of years now. I think
20 years or more in automotive sports. And as I was interviewing Rick, he said
this. He says, "Paul, you know we need to just assume that we
don't have all of the information." And I thought it was brilliant. And so,
I repeated that a little later in the podcast. I said, "Earlier earlier, Rick, you
said that we shouldn't assume that we have all of the information." And he
stopped me. He said, "Paul, is not what I said." I
thought I got it. He said, *"No. You said that we shouldn't
assume that we have all of the information.
I said, "We should assume that we don't because that puts us in a whole
different position" When you assume you don't have all of
the information, you're no longer in a position to give
advice to anyone."* Unsolicited advice. When people
ask for advice, it's because they trust you
to know something that maybe they don't. That's a whole different game. And I
think as we offer that and are willing to supply
that to people, that's going to be awesome.
As far as unsolicited advice, assume that you don't have all of the
information. Get yourself into that green quadrant
and show up for people in a much more powerful way.
This will give you influence. I promised you during the video that I
would tell you how to get to the Positivity Power-Up.
Actually, you know what? Let's shortcut this thing because
you can buy it as a standalone product for about $300
but you can get it as part of your membership
at Live On Purpose Central. That's the best way to access it.
The influence quadrant is module 5 of the positivity power-up.
Go to live on purpose central. Go.liveonpurposecentral.com
and you can connect there to the positivity power-up
and a score of other resources that are available for you.