We can spend all day giving advice to our friends. And most of the time, we’re right. But how often do we step back and realize that what we’re telling them is what we need to be hearing as well?

We teach best what we most need to learn.

It happens to me a lot.

Of course, my advice comes largely not from what works for me in life, but from what I have learned over the years, and from the standards I hope that I can one day hold myself to. When I say that sentences shouldn’t end in prepositions, I know that I’m doing it, too, but I hope one day to get there — and reminding you not to do it hopefully helps it sink into my own head as well.

Some of my advice, I think, is well learned. And at high prices — which is why it sticks with me so well. I don’t think that everything you teach is something that you haven’t learned, yourself. The only way to find out, though, is to learn to look at yourself objectively enough that you have an easier time recognizing when your advice could apply to yourself as well as others.

One thing I think is also important to remember — a caveat to giving advice, or to taking it. Almost all advice worth mentioning here is life-specific. What works for me won’t necessarily work for Wade or Kasey or Richard or Neely, and vice versa. That shouldn’t stop you from giving me advice, but if I don’t take it — well, it’s nothing personal.

Probably.