I really will have to write my manual since I have so much to say. The question on advice is, what are the motives of the advisor?
1/ Sharing, and money. They are willing to sell expertise. Fair enough.
2/ Things people wish they had known: they wish to share experience and views. Of interest.
3/ Recitation of things they wish to learn (but do not understand yet), or poses they are trying to strike (not very well, yet), and which they spout as truth. I have experienced a great deal of this and believe in watching out for it. I could say quite a lot about why, since these people may, in addition, be trying to learn falsehoods or strike poses that are not really very advantageous.
4/ They want to mislead and discourage you. “Rest, dear, your achievements mean you are working harder than you can bear,” is one I have heard enough that I literally sit on my hands when I hear it now. I can handle the nausea it causes me, but it also raises my adrenalin level. I want to beat these speakers down with any heavy object at hand — just as I could Boyce and the Boyceans, supercilious oppressors all.
5/ They are dispensing advice for their own benefit, to prove that they deserve to be where they are and that we are truly in a meritocratic system. Some of the people who do this really believe they are being kind to the masses, dispensing rare drops of wisdom, but really they are only demonstrating how sheltered their lives have been.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 