# Best advice you've been given for the all wrong reasons?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-advice-youve-been-given-for-the-all-wrong-reasons/590096>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [July 23, 2011, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-advice-youve-been-given-for-the-all-wrong-reasons/590096 "2011-07-23T18:33:26Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![RoeCocoa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7feea3/32.png) [@RoeCocoa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RoeCocoa)\
**Post date:** [July 23, 2011, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-advice-youve-been-given-for-the-all-wrong-reasons/590096/1 "2011-07-23T18:33:26Z")

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Inspired by [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=617395): sometimes people give you good advice for the wrong reason. I don’t just mean advice that you didn’t want at the time but have come to value; I mean advice that’s based on wrong assumptions but turns out to be sound anyway.

For example, I was at a dinner party when one of my parents’ friends said, “You need to learn how to make small talk…”

Which is true; I could probably make more friends and improve my career if I learned better ways to fill those uncomfortable silences. But she also gave a reason for her advice:

“You need to learn how to make small talk, if you ever plan on getting married.”

I guess that’s true too, but I’d already told this person that I like being single.

So, what’s the best advice someone has given you for all the wrong reasons?

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**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\
**Post date:** [July 25, 2011, 11:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-advice-youve-been-given-for-the-all-wrong-reasons/590096/2 "2011-07-25T11:00:01Z")

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> [@RoeCocoa](#):
>
> Inspired by [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=617395): sometimes people give you good advice for the wrong reason. I don’t just mean advice that you didn’t want at the time but have come to value; I mean advice that’s based on wrong assumptions but turns out to be sound anyway.
> 
> For example, I was at a dinner party when one of my parents’ friends said, “You need to learn how to make small talk…”
> 
> Which is true; I could probably make more friends and improve my career if I learned better ways to fill those uncomfortable silences. But she also gave a reason for her advice:
> 
> “You need to learn how to make small talk, if you ever plan on getting married.”
> 
> I guess that’s true too, but I’d already told this person that I like being single.
> 
> So, what’s the best advice someone has given you for all the wrong reasons?

when I was an impressionable young girl my mother told me, “In this world, a woman has to be either pretty or smart. You better be smart.” needless to say, I was wounded…but it turned out she was right.