Creating Space to Make Mistakes
Last week we touched on the discomforting idea that as humans, we all have weakness. We can’t beat them, but we can join them, per say, by meeting our weaknesses where they are, getting comfy with them and transforming them into strengths. Changing our weaknesses into strengths takes time, effort and most critically, it takes making many, many mistakes.
With that in mind. . .
We must create space to make mistakes.
Moving a challenge from a weakness to a strength takes trial and error and it takes making mistakes as does taking risk, trying something new, being creative, an out-of-the-box thinker, or daring. There’s not a one of us out there that hasn’t made a mistake before and while that’s the case, mistakes are the black sheep of almost every family.
At some point, as a culture, we came to know mistakes as the enemy, avoiding them at all costs and doing everything in our power not to fall “victim” to them. We, somewhere along the line, learned to dodge situations that could induce mistakes and avoid taking action that held the potential for mistakes to arise. What did/does this look like? It looks like not speaking up when you have a new idea. It looks like not taking a new job because you're not sure you have all the solutions to that new company’s problems just yet. It looks like not confronting your spouse about a difficult subject for fear that it might come out wrong. It also looks like selling ourselves short in countless other situations where there’s a possibility things could go awry.
Lucky for us, the pendulum is starting to swing the opposite direction in industry, business and other workplaces around the globe. We’re realizing that without an opportunity to make mistakes organizations become stagnant and lack innovation, creativity and the change that will propel them into the future. We’re realizing that without mistakes there’s no learning, growth or forward movement. Without mistakes there can be very little progression.
With all that being said, I, like many of you am still very hesitant when it comes to making mistakes. At times I hold myself to an unrealistic standard of perfection and beat myself up when things don’t go as I originally planned they would. Those who know me best can attest that I surely have perfectionist tendencies and often I am my hardest critic. If this sounds familiar, not to fret, we are in the same boat and we only need to focus on creating space to make mistakes!
Here’s how I’ve been training myself that mistakes are ok and creating space for them to live in my daily life:
Remind myself, I am NOT my mistakes. They do not define me now and they won’t define me in the future.
Adopt a self-forgiving approach. Often I am judge, jury and executioner all in this little ole head of mine. Not only is that a HUGE waste of time and energy, but none of that effort I’m exerting is actually helping make anything better. Instead of beating myself up about the mistakes I’ve made, I speak to myself lovingly and provide myself some encouragement. Most importantly, I forgive myself!
Stay present. When we live in any time but the present there’s a tendency to get ourselves caught up in aspects of life we have absolutely zero control over. We can’t change the past so there’s no sense spending loads of time thinking about it or trying to “re-do” it differently in our mind. We also can’t control the future and have absolutely no idea how things will play out. Anticipating future mistakes that could possibly, sorta-kinda, on an off chance maybe happen is, you guessed it, a waste of our time. Live in the now!
View mistakes as a means for improvement. When asked how it felt to fail so many times while attempting to invent the light bulb, Thomas Edison replied, “I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.” Without those 10,000 mistakes, we could still be sitting in the dark after sundown people! Making mistakes present us the opportunity to iterate and try again and that’s really all we should see our mistakes as. . . opportunity.
Mistakes are just that, mis-takes. They are a chance for a re-do and an opportunity for us to find a new, better, more efficient, more practical way of doing things. We can’t find the things that work well in our personal lives, professional careers, relationships, hobbies or what have you until we’ve uncovered the things that don’t. Our mistakes make us stronger, more relatable and better versed, now we need only create space for them.
Light, Love & the Highest Vibes,
Lon
