Episode summary introduction:

The principal focus of our episode centers on the profound necessity for individuals to embrace the counsel they solicit, as we unravel the complexities underlying the human tendency to disregard valuable advice. We assert that no one should traverse the journey of life in isolation, and as such, we, TC and Maddog, endeavor to illuminate the path forward through meaningful dialogue about the paramount issues that affect our daily lives. Throughout this episode, we reflect on the myriad reasons that might compel a person to ignore sage advice, including the intricacies of ego, individuality, and societal expectations. Furthermore, we explore the critical importance of being receptive to guidance, particularly when it diverges from one’s established comfort zones. Ultimately, our discussion serves as a clarion call to recognize that while advice may not always resonate immediately, its potential value should never be dismissed.

Topics discussed in this episode:

This podcast episode presents a nuanced dialogue on the theme of advice and the multifaceted reasons individuals may choose to disregard it. The hosts, TC and Maddog, engage in a thoughtful examination of the interplay between personal experience and external guidance. Their discussion is framed by the recognition that advice is not merely prescriptive but often reflects the complexities of individual circumstances and personalities. They articulate that the act of seeking advice is inherently tied to one’s readiness to receive it, highlighting the paradox that arises when one solicits input yet remains unyielding in their own perspective. The speakers advocate for an introspective approach, encouraging listeners to reflect on their relationship with advice and to consider how their own biases may shape their responses to it. The episode concludes with a reminder of the intrinsic value of advice, urging listeners to approach it with an open mind and to seek out the lessons embedded within, regardless of their initial resistance.

Walkabout takeaways:

• The podcast highlights the tendency for individuals to ignore good advice, often due to personal ego or a lack of alignment with their own perspectives and values.
• Listeners are encouraged to recognize the value of advice, even if it does not initially resonate, as it may contain wisdom that can be beneficial in future situations.
• It is essential to act on good advice rather than becoming paralyzed by over-analysis, as taking action is often the key to success and personal growth.
• Finally, we discussed the significance of learning from past experiences and the advice of others, suggesting that wisdom can often be found in unexpected places.

Reference Links:

1. Tim McGraw – Can't Tell Me Nothin' Lyrics | Genius Lyrics
2. https://erep.com/blog/what-is-the-best-advice-you-never-took/

More about E-Walkabout:

To learn more about Electronic Walkabout visit us at www.ewalkabout.ca.

If you want to read more “Thoughts of the Day” check out TC’s Book at Amazon:

“St. Mike's Fortunes”

A special thanks to Steven Kelly, our technical advisor, who keeps trying to teach these old dogs new tricks when it comes to sounds and recording!!

“Remember to take advantage of the moment before the moment takes advantage of you!”

Electronic Walkabout. No one should have to walk through life alone. We share the good times, the bad times, and the best times.

Everyone needs a little direction now and again. And TC and Maddog are here to show you the way.

A podcast where we talk about the important things in life. Come journey with us.

The Electronic Walkabout.

Time flies when you're having fun and I hope our listeners are taking the time to look after themselves in this busy world we live in.

You blink nowadays and two months goes by. It's crazy.

Yeah, there's a Kenny Chesney song where he talks about blink and he's talking about basically you. You blink and before you know it, you're, you're marrying your high school sweetheart. And before you know it, you're in the old folks home.

And yep, it's just, there's that other one. Five more minutes. Like they're all just about getting time back in your day, in your life.

Yeah, I mean, one of our daughters is literally 35 today. And if that. And I, I, I was thinking about you because you've been down this road before. But doesn't that make you feel old.

When you realize my son turned 35 two days ago. So yeah, it puts a little more gray in the beard. And you know, internally we think we're young and then you see the numbers like that.

It's like, oh man, I keep telling.

Janette, like upstairs, man, I'm still young and, but I pre, I appreciate that I had to kind of add oil to my body every day just to make it move. But that's okay. Anyways, Mad Dog, to the topic at Cahan, have you ever gone searching for advice and totally ignored it after you received it?

But that's a good question. I don't know. I know I've searched advice a lot, but selectively choosing to ignore it.

I don't, I can't recall a time, but I'm sure there must have been one or two instances where I didn't take that said advice.

Well, it does sound counterproductive, but I will say that it happens and I'll probably share an example where I've done that. But with, with reason, of course stuff as far as I'm concerned. During this episode, we're going to talk about why this may happen.

More importantly, how to manage this advice. But first, as always, a thought for the day. Sage advice is only good when you listen. Waiting until we are ready to listen. Maybe Too late.

Deep Thoughts by tc that's what they should be called.

Well, there's another book coming out soon. Maybe I'll.

That's right, dude.

What could be the reason why you might want to ignore the advice that you've been getting? And let's just assume it's good advice just for sake of discussion.

Yeah, I think you know a lot of that.

Well, see, I don't know because you would like to think if somebody asks for advice, they either don't know or looking for more insights into something.

So if somebody gives you good advice, I don't know why you wouldn't take it, but I think a lot of the times it might be ego is like, oh no, I don't need to. I can do it this way. Better that that would be my thought. But why wouldn't you take good advice?

You're, you're, you're absolutely right. I'm. I'm sure that ego does come into it, but kind of one of the things that they are suggesting.

And one of these days I'm going to meet whoever they are, just let them what I think about their advice. But it's again, getting to perspective, individuality. So if you give me advice that doesn't fit my personality or something I would normally do.

It's not that I'm ignoring your advice, I just, it. I don't think it's going to work for me. That's where my mindset is. Which at, at the time you might be shooting yourself in your.

In the foot by doing that.

If somebody says to me, oh yeah, the best, fastest way to get there is to run 30km and then hop on a bike, I'd be like, okay, thanks. And ignore that advice.

Yeah. As you call your Uber.

Exactly. Ye.

This. Why do we resist good advice? Consider this advice.

And this is advice that you would, I'll say generically speaking that you would hear rush into it, slow down and think it through. You could, you could like so many different contacts. We're talking about buying a car, buying a house, getting married, whatever.

Whatever you can think of. Stop over analyzing everything and just make a move.

Yeah, I'm sure that is a roadblock for many, many people that probably have great ideas and have received great advice. But if you don't act on it, then what good is it?

You don't need all the facts. Trust your gut.

Yeah, you got to make mistakes. And I think that's probably the thing too is people afraid to make mistakes, that they want to have something done perfectly.

But in my Experience, the more you try, the more often you are to get it right eventually. But you got to be willing to not succeed all the time.

And this might kind of falls, I think partly into what you were suggesting from an ego perspective. But don't go it alone. Ask for help.

And you know, sometimes people have done things you know well before you and if you pick their brain or get some advice, it probably will save you whether it's cost or time in the long run.

Okay. And just to follow up that, then put it in perspective, I'm just going to read this.

But if you're a decisive, action driven person, being told to slow down feels like torture 100%.

I agree with that fully.

If you thrive on exploring options, just make a move sounds reckless. If you pride yourself on thoroughness, trust, your gut feels flimsy. And if you're wired to be independent, asking for help feels like weakness.

Those are all true. Yeah, I can recognize with those on numerous different levels.

I'm just thinking as a trusting your gut, how do you think that works at the poker table? Maddog?

Well, that's.

I don't know.

I've got a couple of sons that are starting to get better than I am, so I don't give advice on Volker anymore. But I don't know, it's just there, there are enough excuses to stand by and if you don't want to move forward, you just kind of outlined for them.

But I think those are also valid.

But yeah, if you're used to doing something a certain way and then all of a sudden the advice comes to do something else, it's not in your comfort zone or your wheelhouse. That might be the reason why you ignore it. So here's a. I have a question for you though.

Yes, go ahead.

In your previous line of work, was there, did you prefer to work alone or did you always have a partner or what was the situation there?

Well, sometimes I had to work alone. But you always had someone you could bounce ideas off. I preferred to have a partner, to tell you the truth. Because getting back to that.

Not that I would ignored the advice because I would be the ones you'd have to analyze but not over analyze because you have to move. That was always my point. Enough analyzing. Take some action, see where it goes, see what kind of shakes out of the tree and move forward with it.

Sometimes I would ask for the advice, number one, to make sure I wasn't missing anything. Number two, to make sure that the direction I wanted to go way wasn't out way out in left field. And a lot of times I would just ask.

And even though they gave me advice that was good advice, it's not something I would have normally done.

And I'm not saying it wouldn't have worked, but the reason why I asked for the advice was just to kind of add an extra layer of, I'll say, protection to make sure I was going down the right rope based on what I thought.

Yeah, I think that if you are have that mindset.

Mindset and can have it applicable like you said, you might not take all the advice, but at least it gives you that temperature check to see if you've covered all your bases or missed something obvious or are going down the wrong path. So.

Well, the other thing too, like, sometimes when I ask for that extra advice, I'm going, wow, I never thought of that. And this, that little piece of information wanted to, what I've decided to do, it's just much better at that point as well.

So there you've, you've checked off a couple of them of, you know, don't be afraid to ask and don't go at it alone in those scenarios.

Yeah. Like, I mean, a lot of times where you are working by yourself, you just really have to, I guess, trust.

Your gut that you do.

I hope it all works out. There's been a couple times, but I might save that for another episode. We'll see.

You don't need all the answers to, to move forward, but where's the happy medium? Because you could, like, you literally could overanalyze.

I know I was dealing with an investigative team once and I just want to discuss about all the options and finally said, enough, enough of this. Make it some decisions and move forward. And that itself was advice, right?

For sure. Yeah. And I think if you stay in that gray area too long, you can get lost or consumed by it within or lo direction.

You know, it's good to dip your toe in the pool and see where things are at. And like you said that we just finished talking about getting as much, you know, external input or advice and then moving forward and taking action.

Now, is it a possibility that we resist the advice? Because it's, we, if we were to follow it, it'd be totally, totally out of our comfort zone.

Absolutely. And that's, that's, that's the whole purpose and benefit.

And you just finished saying that, that you asked for advice, you might not have taken it all, but it definitely helped clarify your stance or your direction.

So.

Yeah.

Okay. And on that, even if you were okay with being out of your comfort zone. Is following that advice easy?

No. I would say no, because it's not something in your normal kind of mo. So if it's.

There's trusting somebody else's gut is almost essentially what you're doing because they're giving you what they think is rights. I don't know, you just. Yeah, there. I don't know what that line is of the happy medium between overanalyzing and moving too quick.

But I think at least if you can collect the data or information or advice and kind of take it into consideration and then just keep on, keep.

It on, like I'll just call it due diligence because that's exactly what it is. And I think if you go ahead and take that tact, nine times out of 10, there's going to be some resemblance of success there for you.

It's just like if I've had friends or family that have, you know, have any type of social situations or something, I'm the first to advise people to go to see therapists. See a therapist. Sorry.

Because you know, they see things all day long and they might have a different perspective and it might be able to give you some, you know, advice that you wouldn't have thought of previously. So. Advice.

Yeah, that's really, really good advice. And I'm just thinking about some of the advice I give some people based mistakes I have made.

One of the, one of the big things that I do suggest, if someone confides me that, hey, I'm thinking about leaving my partner, my first advice is said, you know what you have to do, everything you can do, possibly make, make sure that it's going to, you know, try and stay together because you don't want any regret there. And if it still doesn't, at least you've made the effort and see what happens from there. Because it's so easy just to walk out the door.

Oh God. Everything seems to be disposable these days. It's easy to get out of everything and anything, relationships included. So it's tough.

So I go ahead and I give you advice, but guess what? You want to argue with me, you want to dismiss it.

Was I looking for advice in or a debating partner? I don't think I would have asked if.

Just to be combative with it, if you will, but sure like to discuss it out, maybe just to flesh it out to make sure it makes sense in your brain. But I don't know about arguing with somebody about it. If you've asked for advice, yeah, in.

Other words, what they're doing, they're shooting down your advice, saying, well, that's not going to work. They've already. And it's. It's certainly not helpful. And I would never take that doc myself anyhow, because you have to be able to.

To look at the bigger picture or to figure out what's going to work. And do you think it might have something to do with who's giving the advice, whether you want to follow or not? Sure.

As we've seen that, you know, if a friend gives you advice, it's like, oh, okay. But sometimes when your parents give you advice, it's like, yeah, no, I'm not doing that.

You know, And I don't know whether it's just the nature of parents, you know, advising their children or, you know, who you're more receptive to receiving said advice. But, yeah, I don't think it all comes across the same.

And don't get me wrong, like, let's say it is me as a dad giving the advice with the best of intentions. Maybe my delivery is not good, but even if delivery is good, it might not fall the way that it was meant to.

True.

And I think that's one of the things that kids don't realize until they're older is that, you know, your parents generally, for the most part, have your best intentions in mind.

So if they are giving you advice, it might not be in line with what you're looking for, but I think overall it's probably going to just make sure that you come out of something positively.

I know there's been a couple of times where I've given that. That advice. The course that's fallen on deaf ears. And like two weeks later, I come up to you. So I got. I did this and this. And I said, oh, yeah?

Where'd you get that idea from? Well, so and so told me this would be the best advice. I said, oh, okay.

Nice person's pretty smart.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I.

Well, that's it. And I know that once or twice, my eldest son and his daughter, I've given him some parental advice, and I've gotten. I got it.

That.

Thanks. It's like, okay. That's why it was. He didn't solicit it. I gave it.

So when I was exploring the, The. The different reasons why someone might not want to take the advice, it brought to mind a Tim McGraw song. And the song is. And. And it makes sense.

My daddy said buy it and you're a crazy boy Cannot tell me nothing. It took two months to fix it up and one day to layer down. I got a little hitch in my get along now you. You cannot tell me nothing.

He knows better than everybody else, apparently. That's. I think that's stubbornness in a nutshell right there. And if he.

But if he doesn't take the advice and he can prove it to himself and do it, then good for him.

And the. What's that one step learning. Because he's got a little bit of a hitch now as he's, you know, had.

Had himself involved in a motorcycle accident where. Where basically dad said, don't buy that thing. And of course, the course of the song. I kind of think I want to just explore this a little bit.

But talk is cheap and free advice is worth the price you pay. I had to find out for myself the hard way. You cannot tell me nothing.

There's that stubbornness.

Talk is cheap and free advice now because. Do you ever pay for advice? And I. I know we talked about financial advice before, but just in general, I don't know.

Okay. You know, aside from if you're going to therapy or something, you're paying to, you know, attend that. But I think just general advice.

People are looking for a friendly, you know, suggestion or comment as opposed to a professional diagnosis. So I would say no for the most part.

But if you're a parent, and sometimes I just tend to sit back and I'll just say, watch the show to see how things fall because. And I might have seen the show a couple times and wondering when again, where it might be a good idea to impart some parental advice. And.

And sometimes I just let the train go down the track, and whether it falls off the track or not, it doesn't matter.

No.

And, you know, as long as they're not at harm or anything like that, it's okay, to your point, to sit back and let them figure it out on their own, even though you know what the outcome is going to be.

So sometimes the best advice is the advice. You don't care at all.

One of my sons come to me. This is back when bitcoin was getting big.

And he's like, dad, I'm thinking about taking a $30,000 loan out and buying bitcoin. I was like, what? And I'm like, oh, okay. And I left it. I'm like, nope. He's like, what do you think? And I'm like, I think that's absolutely ludicrous.

I said, it's just something in the ether that apparently has a value. And said it's not like if you bought a car or a trailer or something, you have a, you know, a tangible asset.

And then sure enough, that whole market tanked. And then it's almost like this. Joe, hey, remember that time when you thought you'd be, Man, I'm glad I didn't do that. But, you know, it was.

I knew it was talk at that point, but I definitely would have done everything in my power to ensure that he did not go and get that.

So how long did it take you to, let's say, first of all, share the advice, number number one and number two, to make sure that your vice sunk in, to make sure that.

Yeah, so he approached me and asked me about it and I gave him my two cents worth right then and there. Just more of the, the pitfalls of what could happen if, if. If this didn't materialize.

So he did date that and he did not go forward and get that loan. And, and it is literally a running joke that we both kind of touch on where it was like if would have done that, it would have been a bad thing.

So I think there's some appreciation for it. I wasn't, you know, I think we get to a point as parents and having adult children that you can't tell them what to do anymore.

You really just have to advise them and then they pick the path that they go down and, you know, hopefully it's the right one. But if you have that relationship with them, where they are coming to look to you for advice and it's a, It's a good thing.

But it certainly sounds based on the advice you gave, that he dodged a bullet.

He sure did. Yeah. Because I'm sure at some point that bullet have been, dad, I need some help.

I just think about the advice that my dad gave me along the ways and a lot of times he took. Took the same tact I do. I'll just sit back and watch and when need be. But he was always there.

If I had a question, there was no, no hesitation whatsoever.

And he had your back. Use your safety catch.

Yeah. And the last time, and I.

It's unfortunate when I say it this way too, but the last time, I think it's probably the only time literally was on his deathbed and I just looked at him and said, do you have any advice? And I just thought to myself afterwards. This is the first time you're asking your dad does he have any advice?

Good advice he gave me at the time but still bigger lesson there is that we have such little time and those people around us that have such I'll say worldly experience we should tap into very advice for sure. Absolutely. Well unfortunately mad.com music is telling us that this episode has come to an end.

But the most interesting thing about advice is that it always has positive in it. No questions asked about that. It may not fit your personality perfectly. It'll be up to you to find that diamond in the rough.

When it comes to advice, listen to it, write it down. It could simply be that you're not ready for the advice but never dismiss it.

I like that and agree 100% to.

Take advantage of the moment before the moment takes advantage of you. To learn more about E Walkabout, please visit us at E Walkabout.ca.

Stubborn.