We look to our family and friends for advice and direction in our lives often. Financial decisions, life changes, career direction… we share our thoughts and ideas with those around us while mulling over decisions. Essentially, the opinions and advice of our loved ones can help shape our decisions, especially in our relationships with other people.

Before you let the advice of a friend or family member shape your personal relationships, its best to consider the following caveats before accepting relationship advice from someone else.

Relationship Advice Differs from Men to Women

It is important to consider the “mental gender” of a person. Both men and women can have decisively male or female mentalities. Some women can have a very “male” mentality about relationships and sex, and vice versa. Male and female mentalities can be complex, but the best way to explain this is in the following way:

Consider your friend (giving advice) and their attitude toward relationships. Do they focus on emotional aspects over logical aspects? This would show a female-dominant mentality toward sex and relationships. Adversely, a woman or man that takes a more casual outlook on relationships and tends to not over-analyze the emotional aspects has a more male-dominant mentality. We all sit at different places on the spectrum, but it is important to know which side of the spectrum the person giving the advice sits-on, in relationship to you.

Simply, If you are looking for emotional answers from someone who doesn’t relate well emotionally in their own personal relationships, the advice you get probably is not going to match what you were hoping  to hear.

This is why you can ask the same question about your relationship to 2 different people and get widely different opinions. Even when you ask to males or 2 females (Their relationship mentalities can be more female or male dominant).

What does all this mean? Consider the dominant mentality of your friend giving the advice. A friend who is more emotionally charged in relationships than physically charged will give advice coming from that side of the spectrum. Be sure that their relationship goals match with yours.

Men, Women, and the Relationships Between Them Are Complex

The relationships between men-and-women, men-and-men, and women-and-women are complex and interconnected. Relationships, much like a dance, are fluid and move… they do not stand still. This forces both partners in the relationship to constantly change and move as well. Without movement, there is no life, only death; and without movement, a relationship stagnates and dies.

Keeping Up With Relationship changes

One of the biggest challenges in a relationship is keeping up and adapting to changes. Human beings are afraid of changes and most tend to recoil from change, or fight back against change. We often are so resistant against change, that we can end up hurting ourselves in our fighting back. This is very apparent in relationships where one or both individuals are facing a imminent change and the relationship is suffering due to fighting against the inevitable.

Be Ready to Hear What Relationship Advice is Given

If you are resistant against change, and someone is suggesting change to you as relationship advice, you will likely fight back against the change and the advice, and possibly the friend giving the advice. We have to be ready to hear what the advice our friends and family give, even if their suggesting an uncomfortable change.

Relationship Advice for Introverts

One of the most common fight-against-change situations with relationship advice comes when someone gives relationship advice to an introvert. Why? Because quite often the advice is to: Stop being so introverted… let your feelings out. Share your emotions. Be outgoing. Don’t take everything to heart. Don’t be emotional!

This is a crux, where we are no longer giving relationship advice, but commenting on a person’s personality. If the personalities aren’t matching up in a relationship, the mismatch is the problem — NOT THE PERSON, their personality, or their characteristics. It is simply a mismatch in connectivity.

Friends and family, at this point, will often point out character flaws that THEY see and believe are causing issues with the relationship. Remember, just because this is THEIR opinion and what they see, does not make it the truth or the best advice for you.

Humans Try to Fix Flaws

Asking relationship advice from a professional (like a therapist or a counselor) is always better, because they have been trained to look deeper into the relationship and not just point out surface flaws (like many of our close friends and family may). Non-professionals like family and friends will always give you advice on your relationship if you ask them for it. We trust our family and friends, but quite often they are not the best for answers. Humans will attempt to fix things, even if they are not equipped with the skills to do so — it is our human nature.

Knee-Jerk Reactions, Cursory Opinions & Shallow Advice

More often than not, the relationship you get from family and friends is going to be biased in some way. Be ready to hear someone stretch the truth to make it more comfortable, or tell you a lie to make you feel better. Friends don’t have a job to do when giving you relationship advice, they are looking for a quick and easy solution. Either a solution to end the conversation, or a solution that seems to work on the surface. These hasty opinions might not be all that reliable and may not be the best for you, but — on the surface — seem to close the problem.

Telling a Friend Hard Truths

Telling the truth can be painful, especially when doing so may hurt someone we love. Expect that a person that cares for you may tell you a lie before telling you a truth that would hurt you. If so, that is not advice at all and should not be considered. Many struggle to identify this and may take bad advice and act on it.

Why Relationship Therapists Are Best For Relationship Advice

We, as therapists, respect the input from family and friends but don’t put a lot of faith in this “advice” solving the problems or bringing closure to the issues. Not only do you need a therapist to act as an outside advisor in the relationship, but therapists dig deeper into the situations to get to the root of the problems. (treating the disease vs just treating the symptoms).  This allows for truly solving the root cause of issues and helping individuals to get more out of their personal relationships.

Should I Listen to Family and Friends About My Relationship?

Yes, family and friends SHOULD give their input on your relationship. However, consider it INPUT and not advice. Others opinions should only help to shape YOUR opinion, and your opinions should be informed and help you to make a healthy decision.

Are you confused by the advice and input from others about your relationship? Couples or Individual Therapy can help you to sort things out and clear your head…