(Sun Yat-sen memorial, Zhongshan) Cigarettes in vending machines, probably not such a great idea.
There is a graceless human tendency to wish upon others the ills visited upon oneself. Instead of pointing successors towards short cuts, you relish seeing them clambering through identical hoops.
The author of this particularly insightful observation was describing her experience advising a prospective journalist. She was asked for advice about how to write a book about Africa in a thoughtless way that was not conducive to actually receiving the desired information (it provoked the sentiments quoted), but she offered some very different and still valuable wisdom. In other words, the person got what they needed, but not what they wanted to hear. Unfortunately, it’s more likely that her wisdom was ignored by the intended recipient.
Sometimes people ask me for advice, and sometimes I offer my advice unsolicited, and in both cases I am usually glad to help and share what I know. But what people want to hear is usually quite different from what they need to hear. On one hand, telling people what they need to hear will probably mean being ignored or disliked, which is counterproductive to helping them. On the other hand, telling people only what they want to hear is not going to help them either, and may end up making me look like an unreliable source of advice too. I try to strike a balance and offer both types of advice, but it occurs to me that it may be better to perfect the art of disguising one as the other. It’s not easy, but I want to try my best to sweeten the bitter medicine of truth.
Most times I get asked about college admissions and applications. I am happy to share whatever I know, though in all honesty, I don’t have much insight into the internal dynamics of admissions processes (only admissions committee members would), at least no more than any conscientious research would uncover. Nor am I well suited to questions about comparisons between universities, only having attended one, and everyone’s mileage varies. But while I may not know the right answers about college admissions, I do know what the right questions to ask are. Here are two recent ones:
1. An acquaintance from my travels who I had helped with graduate scholarship applications earlier (unsuccessfully) was still pursuing her goal of working in the development/aid industry and continued to apply to graduate school. This time, she wanted advice on whether to attend a particular masters program in the EU, which I was unfamiliar with. To answer her questions, I suggested some topics (placement, funding etc) for her to ask the department about. But I also felt that what she needed to hear was whether or not attending this program, or any graduate program, made sense with her career goals, and advised her to rethink it. She wasn’t too keen on that, perhaps because she didn’t have very clear career goals, and eventually decided to attend, despite the lack of funding and a placement history that may not have been a good fit.
2. Another friend was considering applying to LKYSPP and asked me how competitive it was (I have no idea). I gave him my (uninformed) opinions on the program, the usual questions (placement history etc) to ask the school about, and some general information about living in Singapore. However, I thought what he needed to hear about was whether LKYSPP or any other program was the best way to get where he wanted to be, and advised him to consider other alternatives. He didn’t seem to want to discuss that, so I did not press the issue.
In both cases, they had effectively made up their minds beforehand, and my answer was mainly to confirm what had already been decided upon. I was glad to help them with their specific questions, but sad that I failed to also tell them what they needed to hear: that what is on the table may not be in their real interests.
For a long time I’ve considered getting what I want to hear the main problem. Finding the right adviser, asking the right questions in the right way. But the real problem may be about being open to the right advice when it comes my way. How to obtain the job I ‘want’ presently may be secondary to what I would find meaningful and fulfilling over the long term. The latter is a far more difficult problem to solve, and more in need of good advice.
An upperclassman working at an MBB consulting firm told me that it hadn’t been his ideal choice to take up the offer, but it was a highly practical one compared to what he really wanted to do, which he is putting off for one or two years. When I suggested that he should count his blessings, given that I don’t expect to even have an offer to consider taking, he replied, “It’s easy to just take any job, it’s easy to apply for what’s available. Waiting for something that you really want, that’s hard.”
Sometimes I need to remind myself to listen to what God is telling me, even if it’s not what I want to hear.
The signs are all around amid the noise. Listen and you will hear