Great Conversations And Unwanted “Advice”

Ever since we announced that we were having a baby there have been dozens and dozens of family and friends offering us advice based on their experience. I am a firm proponent of gathering as much information as possible from as many people as possible especially from those who are parents. We have already had a variety of great conversations and have received a tremendous amount of excellent advice since the announcement and we are constantly receiving little bits of wisdom every now and again. It is amazing how much love and support that we have received and we are grateful for those people in our life. Yesterday was one of those days when we felt that warmth as family continuously approached us, offered their congratulations, and chatted briefly about how my wife is holding up. But it was not our day and we all wanted to enjoy the party, the real reason why we were all together.

Of course, over the past couple of weeks, there have also been a few people that keep popping up and offering lectures of what we should be doing and what we are currently doing wrong. They have also offered their pessimistic views on what they “hope doesn’t happen” while mixing in monologues about how we can avoid unrelated problems that they know absolutely nothing about. This is usually followed by “offers” to gain some additional practice in the coming months because we have obviously never been around infants and know nothing about some of the unpleasant aspects which they proceed to outline in great detail.

These people have a commonality, they are the center of the world. It is not a dialogue, it is a matter of they know what is best and we need to do it that way or we are wrong. This characteristic also encompasses a few people that are not excited about the good news because that means that we are not able to give them as much of our attention anymore. Did I mention that these people are over five years old? Keep in mind that we prefer to have the quick conversations and move on to another topic. There are too many great things happening to many fantastic people in our life to focus on ourselves or any other single person.

This is a very special time in our life and we want to embrace all the positive energy, unique experiences, and great people in our life. While, for various reasons, we can’t get rid of all the negative people and energy, we will do our best to minimize them and focus on the love and support. At the same time, we are going to continue living life and celebrating the amazing events and milestones of our friends and family. Of course, we won’t turn down great advice now and again!