I can solve her problem.  I know I can.  I know I can.  I just know I can!

But she won’t listen.

I can solve his problem.  I know I can.  I know I can.  I just know I can!

But he won’t listen.

I can solve everybody’s problems.  I know I can.  I know I can.  I just know I can!

But they won’t listen.

And oh no!  I bet they sometimes feel the same frustration with me.

So what’s the answer to this quandary?  Can you solve it?

Why won’t others take our advice, and why won’t we take theirs (most of the time)?

Is it because they/we are stubborn?  And the solutions will force us to go in directions we don’t want to go?

Or are we just not insightful enough to get deep inside one another’s problems to really understand them?

Don’t know.

Friends and family (well mostly family, who tend to be so ouch brutally honest), say I give way too much advice.  And so with The Great Pause and midlife, I am learning to just keep my mouth closed, at least some.  (Blog excepted.)

But if someone says, “I need your advice,” this old brain goes to town.  Yippee!

What about you?  Are you a giver of advice?  Or has age taught you to hold your wise tongue?

Photo: I took this picture from a fourth grade arithmetic test my mom saved. I got a 98%.  Funny, no math tests exist for Barbara Kiehne [Younger] once she got into Algebra Two.  Maybe a tutor or a wise math friend could have helped her, but she was too stubborn to ask for advice.

Note that the test was mimeographed.  Remember the fumes!  Those were the days.

  

Barbara Younger

Barbara Younger blogs from her home in Hillsborough, North Carolina. Along with Friend for the Ride: Encouraging Words for the Menopause Roller Coaster (http://friendfortheride.com), she writes books for children and adults. She lives in an old house with her husband Cliff. and collections of everything from dolls to buttons to bookmarks. She's the mother of two grown daughters and the grandmother to one adorable baby boy!