# 97 on my 99 Life Tips–A List is: Do not borrow problems not yours to solve. Life will give you enough to do.
Do you know what the biggest problem facing most people is? Their biggest problem is that they don’t know what their biggest problem is. Maybe this is you.
We all know people who make it their life’s work to stick their nose into other people’s business. We’ve all got friends and family and co-workers coming out our ying-yangs telling us how to do this or that, or how to fix something or other we know good and well they have neither experience nor expertise we can rely on.
Don’t do that. Don’t borrow problems that aren’t yours to solve. You just make yourself a royal pain-in-the-ass. Life will give you enough to do just focusing on your own shit.
When you receive unsolicited advice from someone telling you what you should do about whatever, and you can see they are drowning in a cesspool of their own unsolved problems, how does that feel? Do you consider them a trusted source? Do you appreciate their concern and rush to incorporate their advice?
No Poseurs Allowed!
Hell no! You don’t want to be that guy/girl/non-binary poseur either.
Leave other people’s problems alone. Leave them alone until they ask you. The invitation to pitch in with help and advice in someone else’s affairs is a sacred trust. Don’t neglect it and don’t abuse it. Be the person who gets asked your opinion, not the kind who never gets asked yet can’t stop giving it.
One day soon, I will write a story titled, How To Know If You Are A Good Parent. The story will comprise one question and two follow up comments.
The question: Do your kids ask for your advice?
The comments: If yes, you are a good parent. If not, you need some improvement.
Now, like chord positions on a guitar neck, this story can be transposed to play in different keys. We can change it from the key of Parenting to the key of Friendship, say. We can then change the title substituting Friend for Parent and keep the content of the story exactly the same. See how nice that works?
Is this too simplified? Maybe. But then, I’m a simple guy. Let’s keep things real, shall we?
Don’t borrow problems not yours to solve. Go to work on your biggest problem. Start by figuring out exactly what that is.
We good?