People Don't Care What You Know Until They Know How Much You Care

Today I want to post about something we all do - give other people advice.

I think it is OK to give others advice but most of the time we do it in the wrong way.  Have you ever been around someone who is always telling you what to do?  Most of the time you don't want their advice and because of the way they present it, you reject it.  Why is that?

Most of the time when we give advice, it is to solve some problem.  I am not saying that you shouldn't give advice or take advice.  Getting good counsel on an issue is always a good thing.  However, from what I have seen, most people don't really care what you know until they know and feel that you genuinely care about and their emotions first.  How do you show someone you care?  One way is to empathize with them or try to feel what they are going through.

Let's look at a bible example.  The shortest verse in the bible is simply, "Jesus wept."  This is an interesting story because it centers around the death of Lazarus.  Now before we get to this verse, Jesus has a conversation with his apostles.  They come and tell him that Lazarus is sick.  Jesus says he is sleeping and the disciples think it is no big deal because if Lazarus is asleep, then he will be fine.  However, Jesus knows that he is dead and basically tells the disciples that he is going to raise Lazarus from the dead.  When he comes near Lazarus' relatives house, one of the relatives comes out and is crying about Lazarus' death.  What did Jesus do?  He cried with her.  See he sympathized with her situation before he told her how to fix the situation.  If He is God and He did it that way, doesn't it make sense that we should also?

If it had been most of us, we would have seen the woman and immediately told her to shut up and given her direction about how to fix the situation.  But that isn't the way to go about it.  We have to show people how much we care about them first.  We have to show people that we are on their side and that we believe in them.  After we do that about 95% of the time, then we might be in a place to offer other pieces of advice.  Now, I am not saying that we shouldn't correct our kids especially when they are young because we have to do that.  But you should still be encouraging them most of the time.  It is a way to let love work in your and their lives.

I ask you to be honest with yourself.  Are you always giving advice without considering what a person is feeling?  If so, please take a minute to understand them completely and show them that you really do care.

That's the Opinion of the Minion