What is the most unhelpful advice you have received?
I'll go first: "You have to have children when you're young," told to me when I was in my late 20s, with no desire to ever have kids, and no means to support them, by someone divorced multiple times with at least one adult child who does not speak to them.
Also: Responding to "How do I deal with this problem?" questions with "Oh, don't worry about it, it's enough that you're even thinking about it!"
Get an advanced education, work harder, never be the one to say, "That is not my job" was the worst advice I could ever receive. I got into debt and was abused and exploited by my employers.
Someone told me that if I wanted to be a history teacher I should get a degree in special Ed to "make myself more marketable." It took 14 years to get out of special education and land a job teaching history
I was a new dog owner, went to /r/Dogs to ask about a particular behavior my dog was exhibiting I'd never seen or read about before (turned out to be normal tho) and every reply I got basically told me I don't know how to care for an animal and that I should give him to someone else.
It was then I realized that it wasn't just /r/RelationshipAdvice that was full of bitter, jealous losers whose advice is always "dump them." It applied to literally every single subreddit dedicated to advice. They may have started with good intentions and knowledgeable people, but over time filled up with people who had no business giving anyone advice.
My dad threw a party to celebrate when I graduated university with a degree in Computer Science.
At the party, my dad's friend took me aside and said "My nephew just got a degree in electrical engineering. Now that's an up and coming field, you should get a degree in that."
Like, alright buddy. Hopefully that career pays well enough for another four years of student debt. I'm still kinda in shock at how dumb of a thing to say that was.
That since I was pregnant it was time to let my career go.
My career is critical to my family’s ability to live a middle class life (and it’s critical to my sanity and happiness, but the person who gave me this “advice“ wasn’t really one for acknowledging or valuing mental health).
The usual acne related ones, like washing my face more or using tooth paste on my spots. Turns out clearasil won't fix your hormones.
Use olive oil instead of sun screen because it works better than SPF and isn't full of chemicals.
When taking a taxi on a short stop over in Dubai, the taxi driver told me not to have blue hair (which I had) or no man will ever want me, while my then boyfriend was also sitting in the taxi, masquerading as my husband (we were wearing rings and just letting people assume we were married, which everyone did. Including the taxi driver!)
Work related: don't make my code too "complicated" or my one coworker can't understand it (read: my coworker doesn't know what async means, and instead of him learning, I'm just not ever meant to do anything async... When processing huge amounts of data... Also, error handling is too hard, don't do that either) yes, I will forever be salty about this. He deleted weeks worth of work while I had covid because he didn't even try to understand it - his reasoning being "it doesn't work anyway, so there's no point in understanding or learning what I'm doing"
Yeah because there's absolutely nothing that needs to be done once I finally get my daughter down. No washing and sterilising, for prep for us or for her, general chores around the house which you can never do effectively one handed. And fuck me if I wanted to try and relax and have an actual evening after they're down too.
"Sleeping like a baby" had also never seemed like such a juxtaposition!
"You just have to work through the pain." I've injured myself multiple times in the past exercising by following this idiotic advice.
It's one thing to push through discomfort, that's how your body gets stronger. But If you're in actual pain, stop and listen to the alarm bells your body is giving you.
When I used to make notes because I don't retain information instantly my boss said "Just don't forget"
I exclaimed: "Thanks, I'm cured!"
The office got a laugh but it still bothers me that he thought it was a choice
My mother once told us to get "a male realtor; the woman realtors don't care as much because they're just doing it as a hobby - the men are doing it as their full time job."
It's not wrong, but spectacularly unhelpful. I mean, a brain surgeon has to be confident to go cutting into somebody's head, but clearly that's not enough, right? Confidence as a romantically-attractive quality is a very particular (and peculiar) performance. Going to a party 110% certain of one's own value, sitting in a corner with a confident set of one's jaw, and silently waiting for the ladies to form a queue is...
...sufficient, apparently, because you just to be confident.
Me: *Suffers from severe depression and anxiety as a teen*
My family: You're just gonna have to deal with it!
They've since gotten my brother treatment for the exact same thing. Meanwhile, I'm still severely depressed and totally untreated because I can't fucking afford it.
When I was a teen I worked as a waiter at a dirty smokehouse/bbq place.
One of the kitchen staff there would make sexual comments about me. Say things like "You're lucky you look good because you're so stupid." And would ask what kind of underwear I was wearing.
I told my parents about it, and the advice they gave me was "Deal with it. You need a job."
Within a month that kitchen staff member had started to grab me and sexually assaulted me.
Back as a young fella, striking out in the dating market a bunch ...
"Just be yourself!"
No, honestly, that was the problem last time - I was looking for something a little more granular and actionable.
This is one of those helpful and encouraging things that people say without necessarily really thinking it through. Deep down in intent, they're right - you can't fake your way to healthy relationships, being insincere or putting on a performance of being someone you're not isn't going anywhere genuine down the road. Absolutely correct, absolutely great advice - but it's never given in sufficient complexity and depth to be useful.
None of those grown-ups were like "Ah yes, definitely be sincere about who you are - but also don't spend a whole date monologuing about the book you just read or your favourite video game."
That you can be genuine and sincere about who you are, while still using your social skills and putting your best foot forward socially just ... didn't occur. At the time, my understanding was that it was a hard binary - either I was 100% me at 100% volume and whatever came out of my mouth was definitely the best thing I could say, or I was stifling myself and being 'fake' in order to build an equally-fake relationship.
It took a friend's brother taking me aside to make it 'click' - he was holding a can or a bottle and was like "So the whole object is all 'real you' yeah? But any time you're talking to someone is like right now - you can only see the side that's facing you. It's all you, it's all honest, but you still want to show them the best side, the best angle, of the whole thing. Don't sprint straight to showing them all of your worst angle just because that's what's on your mind that day."
Ah yes, my ADHD ass will just magically find this focus thing you speak of instead of the long and brutal process of finding the right combination of meds and therapy. Problem solved. /s
"Try again." Particularly involving schoolwork. Derelict teachers then complained when the result of trying again would be identical, to the letter, for the same reasons as the first time. But teach? They did not.
When I would have a problem with my body like shoulder impingement and ask for advice, I would often be told by people "nah, you're too young too have that"
I was in a “troubled youth” cult for many years. “Unhelpful advise” is an understatement compared to the heaps of fear-driven doctrines and rituals we had to follow, lest be homeless. I could go on for days about this topic, but the biggest “unhelpful advice” was to cut all of my childhood friends from my life completely, on the basis of “my own good.” I am now a virtual stranger to them, and although I’ve somewhat made amends, nothing will ever make up for our lost years.
And not me directly, but some years ago when my friend and I were both desperately seeking work, and running up against the "you need experience to get a job to gain experience" conundrum. His mentor told him to stop being so precious, and get a boring corporate job with a pension, maybe one that would pay his law school tuition. It wasn't a thing yet, but wow, it would have been the perfect time to reply, "OK, Boomer."
My dad once told me that if my relationship with god was good, my grades would take care of themselves. I know what he meant was, “if you do the things god wants you to do, you’ll also be doing well in school”, but it’s still horrible advice.
More recently, my mother-in-law has been saying to my wife that she wishes that my wife could have faith in god’s plan because it just helps her in own life so much. I always roll my eyes at this. If there is a god, and he has a plan, his plan sucks ass and he plays favorites for sure.
Gee. Thanks "doctor" for your advice. Obviously I'm going to listen to you after you watched a three minute YouTube video and not the doctor with six years of medical training and education!
"Do something that you love and you'll never work a day in your life."
Bullshit. I worked in the video game industry in a field I'm very passionate about with great people who were all talented. But the industry burned me out and almost killed my passion for games as a hobby with the endless unpaid overtime, constant crunch and deadlines, fairly low wage and all that investment was rewarded by eventually being let go along with all the less senior staff because our studio was bought out and the parent company told to cut expenses.
Don't work for the video game industry, people. Make indie games by all means. But stay clear of the big names.
2 days ago we had a moving up ceremony, and the speaker said that the secret to a successful life is "Honor your parents and Honor God". That advice wouldn't apply to everyone...
"Just be yourself and you'll make lots of friends at your new school."
Four years of constant bullying and loneliness later: I have one acquaintance that would eventually become my friend after a few more years. I also have basically no self-confidence, and my social development is set back half a decade as I'm still looking for friends to have sleepovers with when everyone else has moved on to normal teenager stuff.