Because you are good and caring doesn't mean that you have to waste your breath. In the relative world, people may consider what you have to say according to its value or their value of you. Too often, it happens that your pearls of wisdom are seemingly tossed away. You may be absolutely right, and still your wisdom is tossed away as if it were nothing at all.

You may even state the obvious. It is as if you point out a misspelling. The person you point the misspelling out to says: "I like the way I spell this word. It feels right to me." You could bring in the dictionary, and the person wouldn't want to concede because he likes to do things the way he does them. What is this?

You want to help your child or a friend. They may even have asked for your advice. And you give it. You mean to make their life go more smoothly, or even save them grief. Let's face it, they want to do it their way, which is often the hard way. They want to do it their way, as if something about their way is sacred. They will hang on to their way for dear life. The fact is they don't want to hear what you have to say. They like their misspellings. You could be a thousand per cent right, and still, they like their misspellings.

And you who are nodding your head right now and perhaps clucking with your tongue, do you not also have a soft spot in your heart for your misspellings?

You say you are listening to your heart. I say you may be holding onto an idea in your head. You're protecting your infallibility. You will accept praise with alacrity, but not advice, even when you invited it. You have your mind made up. Your mind made up is a closed mind, dear ones. Sometimes it has happened that you don't even listen to your own sage advice.

It is like you want to go to San Francisco in a hurry, and a truck driver marks on a map for you the route he takes twice a month, and then you say to yourself: "But I like it this other way."

Of course, you are free to go to San Francisco by any route you like and be late, and yet why did you ask the truck driver for his advice?

You have free choice to listen or not listen. You have the choice to waste someone else's time and your own or not.

Perhaps you could kindly make clear in advance that you would like to know what is good about the decision you have already made.

On the other hand, if you do honestly want to learn something, and the free advice asked for and given isn't what you like, if you are sincere, you can ask questions like: "Why do you suggest this? How do you see the two different scenarios? What outcome do you see ...?"

When you ask for more information, whatever you decide, you have honored the person who honored you.

If you are the advice-giver, and your advice is true, and the other person doesn't listen, can't or won't, who has the difficulty, beloveds? It is not the other person's difficulty. It is yours.

Value yourself as much as you value the person who has asked for your input and whom you have wanted to help. You are worth the time you give away to someone else. Make good use of your time. If you are repeatedly asked for your assessment, and your response is repeatedly glossed over, then it's time you gave yourself some good advice.