A few weeks ago while I was on my deathbed with some stomach bug, my mom called me to ask me what the best advice she'd ever given me was. I told her I'd have to think about it and then write a blog post. I'm pretty sure I also told her I was dying. She is familiar with my hyperbolic rhetoric, so she basically ignored me. (And she probably thought to herself, "Where did she learn to be so dramatic? Can't ever imagine who taught her that.")
I've had ample time to think about this and finally am getting around to writing a post about it.
The best advice (or at least the one I try to apply most often) is this: An unsaid compliment is an insult. When I hear things I like or see things I like or somebody does something that impresses me, I tell them.
One time when we were going into a grocery store (the grocery store where I worked as a teenager, actually) my mom complimented some stranger on her purse. I was mortified. My mom had just gone up to a total stranger and told her how beautiful her handbag was. A STRANGER! How embarrassing! And that's when my mom told me that an unsaid compliment was an insult. (I believe that it was her mother who told her that.)
While I don't necessarily agree that an unsaid compliment is equal to an insult, I do think that pretty much everyone likes compliments. Why not brightens somebody's day by giving them a meaningful compliment? It doesn't have to be elaborate, just sincere.
4 comments:
Hadn't heard this. A nice smile almost always works, too.
I was watching TV when the question came up, what is the best advice your mother ever give you.
The first time I ever heard that an unspoken compliment was an insult was at a fireside by Danny Whites wife. It hit me like a ton of bricks. How often we let a good deed pass us by. It is so easy yet we just don't take the time, a second out of our day to make someone feel good about them self.
I like your blog. (smiley face)
Good idea. I think I'll remember this for a long while.
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