How to tame your inner advice monster

As soon as somebody starts talking, your advice monster wakes up with, "Oh, I'm going to add some value to this conversation!"

Learn to tame your advice monster. To train it, you need to understand it.

• The “Tell It” persona: This persona is very loud and convinced that the only way to add value is to have all the answers.
• The "Save It" persona: This persona is subtle. It tries to convince you that your only job is to rescue everybody. You're not allowed to let anybody stumble, struggle, or have a difficult time.
• The "Control It" persona: This persona is very crafty and has convinced you that you only win if you maintain control at all times. If anybody else takes over control, even a little, you (and they) will definitely fail.

Your advice monster is really saying that you are better than the other person and they are not good enough.

However, you are losing that connection to your humanity, your empathy, your compassion, and your sense of vulnerability.

The best way to tame your advice monster is to replace it with a new habit of staying curious. Questions that may help you achieve this:

• Ask the other person what they think is the real challenge? It helps them to find the important issue and prevents you from providing them with a quick, wrong answer.
• Ask, "What Else?" The first answer the other person will give you is never their only answer. It will help them to delve deeper into the situation.
• "What do you want?" This is a very powerful question. When they know what they want, they get to move toward that action with autonomy and confidence.