Most of us have Solomon Paradox

417 Words | 1 Min 40 Sec Reading Time

We are much better at giving advice to other people than giving it to ourselves. But why is that so?

Sometime ago, working on one of my assignments and I was mired with the different instances it carried. I was new and unwittingly, I made some mistake and fortunately the senior management helped me to undo that.
While doing so, one of my mentors suggested me to disengage myself whenever I get too occupied with my undertakings. Because, involuntary we become myopic with the scope, and consequently, the ability to mark the inconsistencies diminishes. Following the same, I implemented this in my next assignment. Surprisingly, unfastening and putting myself in others perspective helped me to alleviate these mistakes.

This reminded me of an old story.

In the Bible, there was a King Solomon. He was recognized as one of the wised King out there than all the men of the East and all the sages of the Egypt. He was wise and respected, the greatest to give the best advice to all problems others have. Despite that, he himself ended up losing his own reign. But why in the first place he failed, even with having the greatest ability to inspire and motivate others?

A psychologist, Igor Grossmann, while studying the nature of human wisdom, he discovered within his research that, “People reason more wisely about other people’s social problems than about their own.” Conclusively, self-distancing allows people to overcome a pervasive asymmetry that characterizes wise reasoning. And apparently, Grossmann coined the term “Solomon’s Paradox”.

Looks a bit perplexing!! Please allow me to explain it in a different way.

Let’s have two different kinds of perspectives from two different people.

One, having a bird’s eye view of the whole maze (Having an overview of the problem). Another, standing in the middle of the Labyrinth (Directly facing the problem).

In the first case, the person is the King Solomon himself, whereas the latter one is the person who is looking for an advice. Having a comprehensive vision to the problem of that person standing in the middle of the maze, King was able to analyse and give the wisest advice to the person. While, when the king found himself in the same situation as the person was, his ability to mark the inconsistencies in his rein diminished. Consequently he failed to advice himself reasonably as he was able to counsel other people.

Conclusion:

Dis-engaging and distancing ourselves sometimes helps to gain a wider perspective of the situation and hence enables us to make a better decision.