Sometimes the people who love to give advice the most are the least qualified to give it. One person’s “words to live by” might be your “words that ruined my life.” For instance, I know I roll my eyes at a lot of the conventional wisdom that gets repeated over and over, like “winners never quit.” As a certified winner, I quit all the time. Calculated quitting is the only way to get out of a negative situation, and getting out of a negative situation is the only way to get ahead in life. Winners quit.
Other times, certain nuggets wisdom is rotten by virtue of who’s giving it, like Kim Kardashian’s recently viral business advice to “get your f**king ass up and work.” Then there’s romantic advice to ignore, like from grandparents who tell you that “men don’t like women who are smarter than them,” even if (or especially because) this is still true for some people.
Or maybe you’ve learned the hard way that it’s important to vet all the life advice that goes viral online. So many so-called hacks are bogus at best, if they don’t end up actually making your life more difficult. (I’m looking at you, “use your old ketchup bottles for pancake batter!”) From career tips, to personal finance, to all areas of your love life: There’s a lot of bad advice out there.
This is where I turn to you, Lifehacker readers. The master becomes the student. What’s the worst piece of advice you ever received? What have you learned about not trusting guidance from just anyone? Have you ever corrected a Lifehacker post in the comments section and want to reach a wider audience now? After reading through your responses, I’ll round up the best ones to share in a post next week. Hopefully, this is how we can learn sorts of advice that actually sucks, rather than discovering it the hard way all alone.
