3 lessons in MYOB-ing

Isn’t it funny how people seem to be experts at giving you advice on how you should lead your life, and yet when it comes to their own lives they seem to be unsure themselves? I think people in general need to enroll in a “MYOB” course. In case you’re wondering what that stands for, google it. Yet we’re all guilty of it at times; telling people what’s best for them or because we’ve gone through something similar or because we think we’re the experts. People always suffer from this close to graduation; “Get a job,” “Go to grad school”, “Get married”. Nobody talks about traveling to India and asking a young boy begging on the streets, “If you could have anything in the world, what would it be?” the answer to which inspired, “Pencils of Promise.” 

So what are the few lessons that would need to be enforced in an “MYOB” course?

1) Recognize that you don’t really know the whole story. A lot of times people reach conclusions and make judgments from the way things look like on the surface, but unless the person sat down with you and explicitly opened up, you’re really not aware of the whole story and you can’t really reach a conclusion or make a judgement.

2) Interfere only when you’re financially invested. So when a kid keeps on failing school, the parent needs to interfere because he’s paying for all that education. The problem is many people interfere, they do so under the claim of being emotionally invested. They care about you. They don’t want to watch you fall….yada yada yada….but you know what, their emotions? Their problem. Not yours.

3) If you really really really care about that person, then you need to ask two questions; “Are you happy? Can you stand on your own two feet?”

The follow-up to the second question falls under point (2). If the answer is no, and they financially invest in you, then they can hen you can interfere since their business becomes yours, technically.

Society has built this whole idea of how success needs to look like for everyone, they don’t realize that some people really don’t care about the mansion with the swimming pool, that they’re just happy with their own mud house and cow, so let them be. People are different. They’re motivated by different things. They want different things.

If you’re at the receiving end of all this unsolicited advice about how you need to lead your life, and you’re tempted to listen to them, ask yourself one question, “If tomorrow, you break your legs and you’re bedridden for two weeks, will they drop their whole life and nurse you back to health?”

If the answer is no, then you know what to do…