A better way to live your life than allowing yourself to get worked up over simple and slight turns of phrase others use or worrying constantly if your phrasing might trigger someone would be to assume the robustness principle and simply live as if everyone is doing the same. "Be conservative in what you do/say, be liberal in what you accept from others". Don't take other's words so seriously and cynically and always assume they have the best intentions.
Just don’t
241–250 of 464 posts
Re: Just don’t
#242I get a lot more mileage out of "have you tried..." than "why don't you just...". As a recent example, I wrote a system that auto-generates PDF packing slips from an order form, to send to a warehouse for picking and packing. Yesterday a client told me to "just make it landscape" while I was explaining why "just making it landscape" won't solve the problem of giving the warehouse whitespace to pencil stuff in, becaus…
You know what sucks about using things like "maybe", "let's try x", etc? Is that I do this regularly in my job, but the managers want more assertive answers.
Re: Just don’t
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
Marriage has taught me to go even further than that. I now ask "are you telling me to get it off your chest, or you want help solving it?". If the former, I don't offer any solutions whatsoever, in any kind of format.
Another useful thing to say, “oh no that sounds terrible, what are you going to do?” It can help reframe from complaining to strategizing, and that can make people more receptive to outside ideas.
Depends on the person as to whether I'd say that. With an employee who's constantly moaning about everything - I'd absolutely say that.
With my wife? Noooo, it would sound like I'm saying "I'm not interested in your problems unless you have solutions". As her partner, she wants me to share the burden of her problems, even those for which she has no solution.
Re: Just don’t
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
Marriage has taught me to go even further than that. I now ask "are you telling me to get it off your chest, or you want help solving it?". If the former, I don't offer any solutions whatsoever, in any kind of format.
The only problem is that you often hear the same variation of the problem multiple times with no action taken to resolve it in between. That frustrates me.
Even better is when there's a agreed upon action and then they just abandon that plan, leading to the same discussion and plan,, only for it to be abandoned again...
Re: Just don’t
#245And if you're a woman, cut the word "just" from your vocabulary, especially in professional communication. It diminishes your voice. "I just want to make sure ..." vs "I want to make sure ..." "Just letting you know ..." vs "I want to let you know ...", "I want you to know ..." "This is just one example ..." vs "This is one example ..." "I'm just going to unblock ..." vs "I'm unblocking ..." I struggle with this myse…
Good advice for stronger written and spoken language, regardless of gender.
Agree, although I think more women fall into this habit of speech, due to societal conditioning to appear non-confrontational and direct. It also seems to reflect more negatively on women as a diffident signal. Thus, while it's generally good advice for everyone, it's more important that women pay attention to their use of the word "just".
Re: Just don’t
#246Funny... my roommates and I used "just" for comedic effect in college. I was stuck writing an algorithm and asked my more-experienced roommate for help. He briefly scanned my code and said, "well, you kind of just... code it." I looked at him quizzically and just blurted, "straight up?" "Yep, just straight up code it." Then we all laughed at the absurdity. He wasn't trying to trivialize the problem, to be clear, but…
Ppl do this for fun in “souls” video games communities all the time as well.
“This boss can kill you in 2 hits” -> “oh well just don’t get hit”
There’s definitely an aspect that can cheer you on if you are in the right mindset to receive it: everything is in your power, conquer yourself and rise up to the moment
Re: Just don’t
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
And responding to venting with advice/criticism is also (clearly) perfectly normal right?
Sure, nobody's saying "you're a bad person for offering advice". In some contexts, though, offering advice can feel like you want to close the person down rather than listen to them, that you think their problems aren't serious enough because you'd solve them easily. I'm guessing you've had at least one occasion where you have a work issue, and your manager is casually dropping solutions that didn't work, and you wer…
To recenter the conversation - in a personal context idle complaints (ie. venting) are considered rude, and are often accompanied by an apology, for a reason. You're basically monopolizing a person's time, and expressing explicit disinterest in their perspective. Using complaint as a coping mechanism is a fundamentally selfish thing to do[1]. Therefore I don't think we should tolerate it idly. If you want to talk and only be listened to, talk at an inanimate object. If you want to be an equal party in a conversation, speak to a human being.
In a work context, it should (always) be about most efficiently solving the problem at hand. When I have a work issue, I preface my request for support with the steps I have taken to attempt to solve the problem. Anything else wastes the time of everyone involved. When this is done correctly, the first thing to come to the mind of the people I'm asking is often exactly what I'm looking for.
> your manager is casually dropping solutions that didn't work
Casual, useless, unsolicited advice is also a waste of time and energy (see "seagull management"). If my manager did this I would promptly tell them to either dig into the problem properly with me, figure it out themselves, or leave me to it.
Re: Just don’t
#248I really wish there was a version of "just" and "only", that has the connotation of there is one and only one thing, but not the connotation of that being trivial. Something that expresses "there is 1 thing and that makes it a big deal!"
Soleley? https://duckduckgo.com/?q=define%3Asolely&ia=definition
PJ Eby used your sentiment in writing about self improvement, where some instruction might say "write a list of three things you are grateful for" and instead what people do is "complain that their life isn't good, wallow in self pity, consider things they want but don't have, write a list of three things they feel obliged to be grateful for but aren't really, roll their eyes at the idea that such a thing could possibly help, etc. etc." and he said "just write a list of three things you are grateful for, and don't drag that other baggage along".
See also, telling people to "just get out of bed" in The Article which means "move legs, lift bodyweight" not "find purpose in life and reason to go on living, discover religion, and only then excitedly jump out of bed cured and full of joie de vivre". And not "reject getting up because it won't cure you and you don't want to be cured anyway because life is shitty".
Re: Just don’t
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd prefer we live in a world where idle complaints are not entertained. If you want advice, complain. If you do not, keep silent.
Then shouldn't you, by your own principles, have kept silent instead of posting that complaining?
I don't think my post is a complaint, more an expression of desire. It has also spawned an interesting discussion, which seems to be the idea here.
Re: Just don’t
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's not fair to ask people for help and then complain about their word usage when trying to help. This is a situation where solicited advice was asked for. This is not wrong but it's not always useful. Being more kind in your language when giving help will carry your point across more clearly. Consider a junior engineer stressed out by deadlines -- sure, they should listen to you calmly and fix the problem, but it…
> Communication is about being understood, not being fair. This is why in some cases it's better to say "Just" instead of trying to hide what you're trying to say in order to maybe be more sensitive without even knowing if that's necessary. For this situation, I tend to phrase it as "Can we just "? which might be received better than "Just ", but "just" is an important word here - I want the other person to understan…
I feel like "just" is a huge source of resentment between engineers and non-technical managers/clients/etc. Can we "just" return true if the picture contains a bird?[0]