Most Advice Is Wrong — Here’s How to Spot the Good Stuff

Most advice is absolute garbage. Not just wrong, dangerously wrong, if you actually follow it. And it's everywhere. Most people aren't giving you advice based on what's best for you. They're giving you advice based on what they would do in your shoes. But here's the issue. They're not in your shoes. They're in their shoes with their experience and their fears and their baggage. And that's not helpful. So today I'm going to unpack why most advice is terrible. Lets start with some raw truths first. Most people don't know what they're talking about. They just don't. They think they do, but really what they have is opinions. They have anecdotes, they have stories. They don't have wisdom that is earned. They have things that they imagine in their head. And that's really what it is. The real key here is that people don't give advice for your benefit. Let me say that again. People don't give advice for your benefit. I know that sounds strange, it almost sounds almost like Machiavellian, but no. Most people give advice because unconsciously or consciously, they give it to feel smart. They do it so they can feel important or to feel validated. It's rarely about you. Actually, most of the time it's all about them. And that's why you're getting such trash guidance. Because what they're saying is not rooted in your context, in your goals, in your constraints. It's them projecting their worldview onto your situation. And guess what? They probably won't even take their own advice if the roles were reversed. So many people give advice that they don't actually take themselves. You know, they say things that you should do that they didn't do themselves, that they didn't actually fulfill in their own lives. So how much do they really believe in this advice if they didn't even do it? You see, everyone sees the world through their own lens. Their upbringing, their fears, their culture, their trauma, their wins, their losses. So when they say something like you should quit your job, or when they say you should never risk that or you should never take that risk, or they say you should raise VC funding or VC money or even something as simple as you should go viral on TikTok, right? So they're not thinking about what works for you, they're relaying their own experience and telling you to copy it. They're saying, this is what I think works based on a lot of different things. It could be based on something they saw. They saw somebody else do something like this. They might have done it themselves, but their context, their situation might be different. For example, if I was training for a marathon and I asked a 22 year old, hey, how do you train for a marathon? They said, well, I don't really train much. I eat, eat chicken nuggets all day and I sleep for hours and I stay up all night playing video games, but I still do all right in the marathon. Should I take that advice? Of course not. I'm not 22 years old. And maybe biologically that works for that person and they're fine. But hey, my context, my situation is different. It's going to require different things. See, the problem, the truth for somebody else may be not the truth for you. Okay? And that's really where advice goes wrong. You need to understand that what is your truth, your path, your way forward, is going to depend on a lot of factors that have to do with you. So what do we do about this? How do we take advice that actually works? So before you even consider someone's advice, I want you to ask yourself a question. How does this person benefit if I follow what they suggest, if I follow their advice? Let that sink in for a moment. How does this person benefit? Think about it. Are they giving advice because it helps you, or is it because it helps them feel needed? Helps them feel validated, Validates their own experience or perspective? Or worse, because it helps their business model? Right? They're trying to sell you something. For example, a coach says you need coaching. Well, do they sell coaching? Well, yes. They benefit by telling you you need coaching. So you got to be very careful. You know, this is why I rarely ever talk about anything that I sell. Whether it's an event, whether it's the $100 BA program. If you need the program, you will find it, you will seek it out, you will buy it if you need it. This is why I give as much as I can through this podcast for absolutely $0 for free, every single week, three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, Friday. I've been doing this for over 10 years because I genuinely want to help people have an easier path forward. Now, if you want something structured, if you want something that's going to help you kind of speed through this, a shortcut in terms of time and efficiency and brevity, then the 100 RMB makes sense. But hey, again, I don't want to tell you you need it. You need to figure this out yourself. That's your decision. Because I'm conscious of this fact. I'm conscious of the fact that of course I would say that, right? Because I would benefit from it. And that's why I don't say it right. Here's another example. An agency that says they were in the moment where they had to actually sacrifice something, they could lose something if they don't get it right. They've been through that experience and therefore their advice actually has a lot more weight than somebody who's just read a book about it. Listen, I've had a ton of people tell me in my life advice like, you shouldn't start a podcast, it's too crowded. You shouldn't build a software company, it's too competitive. Imagine if I listened, you know, we built Webinar Ninja, the Hundred Dollar mba, this podcast by giving unfiltered advice every single time I publish. I didn't ignore everybody, okay? I didn't ignore everybody that I spoke to by only paid attention to the people who done it, who done it well. And I always ask myself, is this person living the kind of life I want to live? Right? Are they doing the things and building the things I want to build? Because if they weren't, what? Why would I take their advice? Because if I did take their advice, there's a good chance I will get the same outcome, the outcome that I'm trying to avoid, something that I don't want. So it's very important to be very critical about who you are taking advice from. And my advice is to test advice. Don't just obey it blindly. This is really approach that I have adopted in the last 10 years is like, don't take advice, but run experiments. Use the advice as input, not orders. So say, for example, somebody gives you advice, I just say, interesting, I'll test that and see what happens. This puts you in control. You use advice as data and not an order. You use it as a piece of information that you can apply to your testing of what you want to do. Testing of what works in your life and business. This allows you to stay flexible. It gives you real data and not just opinions. And, and that's how entrepreneurs operate. They take information and they see if it will work for their situation. Now, before I go, I want to give you a quick checklist to run any advice through this filter. Okay? Number one, has this person done what I want to do? Number two, do they understand my specific context? Are they asking me questions? Do they know my situation? Number three, are they benefiting from giving me this advice? Now? If the answer is yes, it's not automatically, I don't want to listen to this person. I just It's a data point. I got to keep this in mind. Number four, is there advice rooted in results or theory? Right? Is it actually tangible results? In fact, a lot of high level masterminds and meetups where you're giving advice to each other. One of the rules that is established is that you cannot give advice to somebody who's seeking advice. Otherwise, unless you have experienced it, you actually have real results. Don't just say, this is what I would do. You know, that is actually not helpful advice. Number five, would I trade places with them in this area? Meaning, are they already where I want to be? Okay, if it doesn't pass three out of the five, in my opinion, I ignore the advice. That's just my rule. You can apply. You could take it again, this is my advice. Okay? So you could test this out on yourself and you see, hey, is three out of five a good way? Maybe I need four out of five. Maybe for you it's like, no, I need five out of five for me to actually listen to this advice. Listen, the world is full of people shouting, you should, you should, you should. But the truth is you should build the muscle to know who to listen to. That's the real skill here. You should trust your own judgment. Take the advice as input, not gospel or a decree. Right? Use it as information to make your own judgment, to make your own choices. Why? Because you will have to live with those choices, not the other person that's giving you the advice. And there won't be there for you when you are stuck, right? And you need to get out of a jam. You're gonna need to deal with that yourself. And it's better for you to make the choices and go through the experience yourself. And most importantly, you should do the damn work, okay? Because no advice matters unless you take action. So test, learn, iterate throughout your life. And this becomes second nature over time. The people giving the best advice rarely are screaming it from the rooftops, right? They're too busy building. This is why I keep these episodes short. This is why I create a podcast where you choose to subscribe and listen. I'm not here trying to be in your face 24. Seven, okay? Those who find this podcast, they'll benefit and hopefully they'll listen to what I have to say, consider it in their own decisions, and help them throughout their journey. If you want help along the way, beyond this podcast, you just sign up for our newsletter. It's our three Things newsletter. Every single week, I give you three things. Something to think about, something to do. So you're building every single week and then something to learn so you're becoming better week after week. It's absolutely free. Just go to 100- MBA-NET, sign up for any of our freebies or resources, and you get added to our newsletter automatically. Again, totally free. It's my way to help coach you from afar. That's it for today. I'm Omar Zinho. If you enjoyed this podcast $100 MBA show, the biggest thank you you can give me is to hit that subscribe or Follow button on whatever app you're using to consume this episode. I will continue to work hard to provide the best, best, best content possible every single time I publish an episode. Thanks in advance for doing that and I'll check you in the next episode.