The Student Room Group
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>

my best friend is terrible at giving advice, should i learn to accept this?

So my best mate is pretty much terrible with giving advice. I told her this and she accepts and admits this herself.

This really sucks though coz I hardly have any other friends or people I can talk to.
When I'm in a serious situation, instead of giving helpful advice, she'll just makes jokes of it and that gets me annoyed, because I need proper advice when I'm in a serious situation.

Im the opposite. I always give good advice to her because I know what to say most of the time, and she told me I'm the best person there is for advice, which is a shame becoz the same can't be said about her.

This really bugs me. Should I just learn to accept the fact she's not good at giving advice like me? I don't want to burden my problems on her, but since I always help her I'd like her to return the favour.
Original post by Anonymous
So my best mate is pretty much terrible with giving advice. I told her this and she accepts and admits this herself.

This really sucks though coz I hardly have any other friends or people I can talk to.
When I'm in a serious situation, instead of giving helpful advice, she'll just makes jokes of it and that gets me annoyed, because I need proper advice when I'm in a serious situation.

Im the opposite. I always give good advice to her because I know what to say most of the time, and she told me I'm the best person there is for advice, which is a shame becoz the same can't be said about her.

This really bugs me. Should I just learn to accept the fact she's not good at giving advice like me? I don't want to burden my problems on her, but since I always help her I'd like her to return the favour.


Not everyone can give good advice, some people struggle to relate to and understand other peoples problems, and hence they cannot give very meaningful advice!

If your friend is loyal and trustworthy, and you have a laugh together then dont sacrifice your friendship over this fact, I understand it can get frustrating when people do not take you seriously! Just talk to her about your problems so you can relieve the stress, and if her advice is poor then do not follow it.

If it gets really serious explain to her the severity of the situation and why you really need help. Its often a good idea to give your friends options that you have already considered to help them give advice, as often they dont really know what you want/whats actually best for you, so if you give her some suggestions to go off then maybe she will be more helpful!
Reply 2
Avatar for Shadez
Shadez
10
Original post by Anonymous
So my best mate is pretty much terrible with giving advice. I told her this and she accepts and admits this herself.

This really sucks though coz I hardly have any other friends or people I can talk to.
When I'm in a serious situation, instead of giving helpful advice, she'll just makes jokes of it and that gets me annoyed, because I need proper advice when I'm in a serious situation.

Im the opposite. I always give good advice to her because I know what to say most of the time, and she told me I'm the best person there is for advice, which is a shame becoz the same can't be said about her.

This really bugs me. Should I just learn to accept the fact she's not good at giving advice like me? I don't want to burden my problems on her, but since I always help her I'd like her to return the favour.


What else are you going to do, send her on a BTEC Advice course?
(edited 8 years ago)
you could ask her why she's struggling to give advice, it might be that she doesn't feel comfortable with heavy conversations or that she isn't confident advising you to do something which may go wrong in which case you could ask her to try and deal with the tough conversations sometimes for you/tell her that you wont hold her responsible if something goes wrong

but probably you will just find it's not something she's good at and that's that, you need to accept it and perhaps look for somewhere else to get advice

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you