Brene Brown in all fierce wisdom reminds us that men are socialized to not “appear weak”.
This set up demands that men have all the answers all the time and be willing to share this knowledge with the world just to make sure that everyone in earshot knows the proper course of action.
Many times I’ve been in the company of men who are total and innate bullshit artist happily spewing their nonsense and offering it up as “common sense”, general knowledge and gospel truth.
I am super clear that so much of our daily lives are spent trying to make sure that no none knows that we don’t have all the answers.
In a culture that thrives on “expert advice” and know-it-alls who get the term “Dr” slapped on their names, it can be difficult and counterintuitive to share anything about what our struggles and feelings of inadequacy contain.
Yet, when put into a situation where we have to confront our feelings around not knowing it all, we often huff and puff our way through an answer.
My personal favorite takes place during professional gatherings were business owners, CEO’S and all types of professional industry leaders gather to “handle” a situation or brainstorm a multi step problem solving technique that will solve every problem known to man.
When things are brought up that people have not prepared themselves to answer or if it feels like an attack(which it will if you have been conditioned to know it all) then all hell breaks loose.
Broken hell is not the problem and can lead to wonderful solutions if handled properly.
Proper handling entails an admission of lack of clarity and the very powerful tool that says: I neglected to consider the following…