Into the danger zone: unsolicited advice

The proverbial can of worms

Photo by Ben Hershey on Unsplash.

Every once in a while, someone on the internet posts the comment “Unsolicited advice is always criticism.” I think I first saw such a post a year or two ago, but some light Googling shows a much longer history. New or not, everyone’s heads explode as they either have a lightbulb moment, or rush to defend un-asked for advice (most likely their own).¹

Since this newsletter is all about the bigger world of advice, I couldn’t ignore this giant danger zone on the advice map. I mostly write about the kind of advice that we actively seek out—self help books, agony aunt columns, and the like—but what do we do with, and how do we feel about, advice that comes to us unbidden?

The statement that unsolicited advice is always criticism gets at an uncomfortable reality under the surface of even friendly and well-meaning offerings: someone is telling you that what you’ve been doing is wrong, and that you should be doing something different going forward.

When I first sa…