bhaskar saikia

It’s fascinating how the same piece of advice can feel like a lifeline to one person and a joke to another.
“Wake up early.”
“Follow your passion.”
“Let go.”
“Don’t give up.”
Each sounds simple—yet their meanings shift depending on who hears them and where they are in life.

For someone lost in chaos, “let go” might feel like liberation. For someone barely holding on, it might feel cruel. “Don’t give up” can ignite a spark in a struggling student but push another into burnout. Even “follow your passion” can sound inspiring to one and reckless to another who’s simply trying to pay rent.

Advice, after all, is born from perspective. It comes wrapped in someone else’s experiences, fears, and victories. What worked for them existed in their reality—built on their timing, privilege, choices, and circumstances. To expect it to fit perfectly into someone else’s life is like lending a pair of shoes without checking the size.

That doesn’t mean advice is useless. It means we must learn to listen with filters—to take what resonates and leave what doesn’t. Wisdom lies not in following all advice, but in knowing which ones to make our own.

Maybe that’s why the world needs both the dreamers who say “take risks” and the realists who whisper “play safe.” Because between those voices, we find our balance—our own rhythm.

So next time someone offers advice, don’t rush to follow or reject it. Sit with it. Try it on for size. And if it doesn’t fit, smile and move on.

After all, what’s absurd to you might just be someone else’s truth.