Great Advice

I am a superfan of Carolyn Hax’s column. I differentiate myself from a regular fan because I even read her daily column when I’m out of the country. So I’ll skip the Skimm for several weeks, but I’ll never skip Hax, even if it means accessing her column over super-slow portable wifi.

Here are ideas from three recent columns that I bookmarked.

Advice One

This was an old column they re-ran a month or two ago about trust.

The need to control is really just a failure to trust. You have to drive because so-and-so will be reckless; you have to keep your mate in sight or else s/he’ll cheat; you have to do everything yourself because underlings won’t be as competent . . . stop me when this sounds familiar.

A failure to trust, meanwhile, is really just a triumph of fear. Fear of crashing, heartbreak and failure in the examples I just gave, but it’s all one biggie — fear of the unknown. Specifically, that you won’t be able to handle any outcome that deviates from the one you’ve envisioned.

Which means the person you don’t trust is yourself. Right?

Isn’t that freakin’ brilliant? Need to control = failure to trust. Failure to trust = triumph of fear of the unknown. Fear of the unknown = lack of trust in your own ability to cope. Seeing it spelled out that clearly made me understand my desire to control the world.

Advice Two

The next was a few weeks ago. Another trust situation, but this time it’s being upset by someone’s history.

You haven’t changed. What has changed is your girlfriend’s understanding of who you are. That understanding changed because you were honest and transparent about your history. Her response to your transparency was to choose not to be transparent with you. Or trust you … Your history made you who you are, the person who chose her — no small thing — and the person who has been honest with her throughout.

It didn’t make me see the world differently, but I just loved how she led the person through that answer.

Advice Three

This was just a little nugget in a column last week about a person wondering if their boyfriend was losing interest:

Being good to yourself is how you learn to recognize the sensation of someone being good to you.

LOVE THAT. Every single person needs to be taught how to be good to themselves so they can find their boundaries.

What good advice have you read lately?