Cliche advice that sets us back

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Perhaps because of my age or because I'm too much my own person nowadays, I fortunately stopped receiving "advice" from people. But most my life I was the target of stupid, ridiculous, tried-and-false, cliche, misleading advice. And I tried it out, to my detriment, of course.

Eg:

"You just haven't met the right people yet."

"When you feel good with yourself, a spouse will just be a nice addition to an otherwise fulfilled life".

"Everyone can ride a bike. Just lose the fear, that's all."

"There's no such thing as everyone wanting to bully one certain person. It's all in your head."

HA! Well advice is like opinions and you know what they say about opinions.

My favorite is "If you just try harder"

Some terrible advice given to me includes:
"You'll find the right woman someday. She IS out there"
"Everyone is shy/introverted/autistic/unemployed"
"Nobody works 9-5 anymore"
"Everyone has bigger struggles finding work than you do" Really? Three full years worth?
or my favorites:
"Stand Tall and the bullies will stop"
"Just ignore them and they will go away"
"Just hit them back. You are bigger!"
I'd like to see how these hypocrites would react if ten armed police ordered them to the ground. Would they try to fight back? They'd probably hit the floor so fast they would break every bone. These morons never realize the bullies have EVERYTHING on their side (numbers, weapons, lack of conscience, naive teachers) and NEVER attack one on one or engage in a fight they might lose.

My favorite is "If you just try harder"[/quote]

A slightly different version of the above, "You're just not trying hard enough,"or better, "If you really wanted to do it, you could, but you don't so you can't."

Advice that sounds good but negates who you are

Back in the 1960s/70s people would sometimes say "start lifting weights so you can beat up the bully". lol

"If you're walking down the street alone at night and suspect someone's following you, never turn around to check. It's very impolite."

"No matter what they do to you, never sue an insurance agent. It's not possible to win against them." (I won against my insurance agent without any difficulty)

"If he said he'll be busy in the near future so you shouldn't contact him or expect to hear from him, it means he's busy. You have to wait. He'll call you again when he's not as busy anymore."

"Be yourself." If I could, I would.
I just don't feel natural around people until I get to know them.

"At work, stay away from the politics." (yeah sure, as if you could keep your job if you ignored the politics)

"If you're kind to people, they'll always be kind back." (this one is not only ridiculous, but dangerous as well)

''The right job will come along one day''/''you've just got to keep trying''
Yes I know I will find a job one day but I still can't help losing all hope when being on job-seekers for 4 years and still haven't been given a chance, even though I have developed plenty of interview skills by now, and I have attended courses, work experiences and still doing voluntary work. God, what more to the employers want?! !!

''Those people weren't worth knowing anyway''
Just because somebody's got arsey with me for standing my ground doesn't mean to say they were nasty people. And it's worse when there is hostility in the workplace and you've got to see them every day and work with them, it's enough to make anyone feel uncomfortable, which is why I try to avoid that from happening. Also I can't seem to handle hostility and conflict.

''Nobody's looking at you - you're just imagining things''
It's easy for most people to say because they are either confident and want to be looked at, or don't really think too deeply about it, but I do and I know people are looking at me without me even looking at them because I can feel it. If I was imagining it, then I would be assuming that EVERYBODY'S looking at me, but occasionally I will pass a person and know that he/she's not looking, so why would I just be imagining some people looking at me and not others? So it MUST be real!

''Maybe people look at you because you're attractive''
I don't think so. You can see I am not the sort to make myself look astonishingly beautiful. I'm just average-looking, I conform to what's needed so I don't stand out, in a positive or negative way, I just try to dress and act in a way to make me blend into the background really, so if that's what I look like I want, that's what I should get, and people should focus on noticing the people who DO go out of their way to look beautiful and eye-catching, since that's what they want. So, people looking at me must be a negative thing: I look ret*d.

''Asperger's makes you who you are''
Wrong - it doesn't with me. It makes me who I'm not, if anything. I seem to know the person I want to be, but the AS stops it and holds me back. I want to be an extroverted party animal who can make friends easily, but I am not, even if I tried to be.

''I can't make/stop someone!''
Every time I suggest something useful, people seem to think I am trying to have some sort of control over them. Like the other week my mum's sister was on holiday from work, and she did suggest ages ago that we go out somewhere all us cousins wanted to go, and so I said to my mum, ''when your sister phones tonight, ask her about the place we were all going to go to.'' I said it in those exact words, but my mum turned on her argumentative tone of voice and said, ''I can't make her!'' And I never said, ''Mum, make her take us to that place we wanted to go!'' She actually suggested it in the first place, and I'm only asking my mum to ask about it to see if she still wanted to go, and if not then we won't. It's called conversing, if you won't ask, you won't know. I'd thought an NT would know better.

''Get a life''
And I just find that offensive and harsh. It's not my fault I have such low confidence.

Here are few of my favorites:

"Just go, you'll have fun once you get there"

"Just suck it up"

"Everyone feels that way sometimes"

"You're making a mountain out of a mole hill"

"You're overthinking this"

I'm sure there are more...I'll be back when they coem to me lol

"If you would just look people in the eye, you would be able to make a friend."

My therapy said this to me at my last session.

"Don't analyse things." (if I'm alive today it's thanks to my analytical efforts to compensate for lack of intuition)

"Just use your intuition" (as if I had one)

"Just go with the flow" (as if autistics could follow the herd)

"Just do as I do" (as if NLD could learn by imitation)

Worst cliche advice I was ever given:

"Don't go out looking for love, it will find you when you least expect it"