Another Set of Eyes

I grew up in a stubborn German home where the theme song appeared to be, "You Can't Tell Me What To Do," a tune that all too often sent the six of us right into a proverbial ditch.  My father was so stubborn that no one could give him any advice at all.  Indeed, he would typically do the opposite, just to prove them wrong.  It's too bad.  Yes, he made his way on his own, but he could have avoided a lot of cliffs and severe detours.

The apple doesn't fall too far from the tree.

As an undergraduate, I shied away from what I saw as criticism in my work.  By graduate school and quite a few crater-sized potholes later, I realized that it never hurt to have another set of eyes take a look at my writing, before I turned it in.  More often than not, there were inevitably enormous blunders I never saw, crevasses in my logic so big you could drive a car through, and paper-thin ideas that had no support at all.  A feeling of pride is always the first big red warning flag that something is amiss.

The blunders are still there.  Even now in my writing, even after I have gone over it carefully, I often run my writing past another set of eyes to catch the not-so-obvious mistakes and to enlarge my view.  

 Ask me questions.  Ask me a lot of questions.  That is how I learn.  

I have come to know the hard way that counsel is not criticism, nor commands, but a very helpful means to   "Have you considered this...?"   The wisest people know that they don't know it all.  They seek, listen and weigh. 

And thank you very much for alerting me to the train I didn't see.

If I mention a person in an article, speech or blogposting, whether named or nameless, I always let them read the piece, first to get their permission and to make sure I told their story right.  I am grateful for those who point out a typo in the second paragraph, or advise me that there is a big hole where the picture was supposed to appear.

And for a more complex piece of writing, I will check with more than one set of eyes.  If two out of three say that they don't get it, I know that the third person is just trying to be kind, and it is time to reconsider.  Editing is not a weakness at all, and reproof just makes me stronger. 

Seek, listen, weigh.  In work, in relationships, in decisions.  There may be, just may be, someone who knows or observes something you don't.  It may save you a huge mistake, or it just might someday, change the course of your life.

Without counsel,
     plans go wrong,
but with many advisers,
     they succeed.

                Proverbs 15.22