Do More Good

An old college roommate of mine had a funny bit. When we’d ask him, “What are you eating for lunch?” he’d respond with a deadpan, one-word answer: “Food.” Okay, it might not seem particularly funny to you. Maybe you’d have to hear him say it, see his facial expression as he did it, and know his overall personality. Maybe then you’d have found it as funny as I did when I lived with him.

Of course, the crux of the gag is that my roommate’s answer was both completely true and totally unhelpful.

Recently, I asked my wife some question about something, and she gave me an answer that was on par with my old roommate’s gag, only she didn’t seem to be joking. So I asked some follow-up questions, and continued to get nowhere until I ultimately gave up and moved on with my day. I spent a few minutes feeling irritated by this. “She gave me an answer; why couldn’t she give me a useful answer?!” For a brief moment, I even considered the idea of saying this to her.

Then, suddenly, my sense of self-reflection kicked in and I recalled several of the countless times I’d done the same to her. Instantly, I knew it wouldn’t be fair to criticize her for something I regularly do myself. When was the last time you gave an answer that wasn’t particularly useful? I’d guess it was within the last week.

I took a moment to close the loop on these thoughts by committing to myself that I would always strive to provide not just any answer to questions that I choose to answer, but a useful answer. Otherwise, why bother?

I thought about this today after reading a nice little article in Psychology Today. In it, Gina Barreca offers a long list of phrases we should say more often, and a shorter list of phrases we should say less. The article is short and well-worth reading, but it’s not rocket science. Still, it’s a useful exercise to consider not just what bad we should avoid, but which good we should do more of. So I’ll finish today’s post by offering my own list of phrases I should use more often.

• Could you use some help?
• Is there anything I can pick up for you while I'm out?
• Can you help me better understand your thinking?
• Tell me about the best thing that ever happened to you.
• How did you get interested in that? 

I’d love to read some of yours, too. Please leave some ideas in the comments.