Never lose your thinking when you listen to your favourite people.
You must be able to listen, process, distill, before you digest. Take it through another round of distillation again before you apply. Understand that while thought leaders try to share wisdom and knowledge to the best of their ability, they are also humans with perspectives and insecurities, that feed into their content.
When you hear stuff like, "I'm a person of very few words, I believe it is wisdom." It is possible that this is someone who is nervous about public speaking, and doesn't speak a lot. The issue isn’t that they're a person of few words, it is that they are unable to speak like you do. When you hear, "I think it's important to focus on one gift." It is possible that this is someone who doesn't have the ability/capacity to excellently do more than one thing per time. When you hear, "You shouldn't talk about yourself all the time, talk about others." It may come from someone who is uncomfortable speaking about themselves. The list goes on.
Personally, I stay defying a large chunk of the things that many brilliant people share. They say, "You cant possibly do this...” I do it. So, I know. I'm often told that I'm an anomaly - an outlier. But I don't really believe that. I believe that I simply didn’t come this far unlearning many things, to be re-programmed by the wrong things. I'm cautious about every single new thing that I'm learning.
So this one is to my content creators and thought leaders: It's always important to remember that we are all humans and no matter how unbiased we try to make our content, it is still tied to our personalities, experiences, etc. One of the ways I get around this is to say, "I believe that...," or "It may be…," or "It is possible…"
When you authoritatively make a statement, you are saying that it is factual. In which case, you better be sure that it's not coming from your personal fears, doubts, and/or experiences.
We are dealing with Human Lives people! Human Lives! You have a responsibility, to the people first, not your ego, not your popularity, not your pocket.
The End.
Adaora ‘Lumina’ Mbelu
Message well received. Thank you so much, ma.
So apt!