I don’t know about you, but I’m not perfect. In fact, I’m far from it. You’ll probably see misspellings and grammar errors here and there. And I’ll admit that some of my posts were 100% mistakes on my part.
I’m pretty ecstatic about it.
And nope I’m not a masochist either.
I’ve just learned something important-you may say life changing-about mistakes over the years.
They are good things!
In fact, I’m almost too thrilled when another error has taken place.
A pimple can be covered with concealer but a blunder? A blunder may need to be exposed no matter how unattractive it is to its beholder. Whether you failed a test, stuck your foot in your mouth, hit send on an angry “I will never send” email, blunders are truth tellers and you’ll be better off listening to what they’re trying to say.
The hard part may be taking it. Sure the lesson may be to spend more time checking your work in advance, or rereading your email, but your head may be saying, “You idiot!”
So what do you do when you’ve encountered a personal blunder?
While failing has the power to make others quit before they’re ahead, it fuels my fire. Yes messing up doesn’t feel good but there are ways to get around it so that you get all the benefits of learning a lesson without torturing yourself to get there.
Get Physical! “When the going gets tough, the tough gets moving.” Get up and get out and do something! I love zumba because it’s fun and challenging to the point that I can’t think about anything else but what I’m doing in the moment. The key is to find something that changes your thinking from past thoughts “Why didn’t I?” to present minded thinking “What am I doing now?”
Forgive Yourself. I’m sure we all know that no one is perfect. Yet, we often don’t give ourselves the break that we give others. The next time you feel like you “messed up,” imagine what you would say to a friend and then say it to yourself.
Have Faith. “It ain’t over ’til the _____.” I once heard a quote that said if everything hasn’t worked itself out, then it isn’t over. I agree. You never know why whatever happened did. Maybe you “messed up” an interview because subconsciously you didn’t really want it. Or maybe you loss one job or relationship only to find a better one to come along later. You never know what will happen or why it happens and it’s better that way. Have faith that things happen for a reason, you may just not know what that is yet.
So the next time you are faced with a blunder, don’t hide from it, cover it up or pretend it doesn’t exist. Instead, look it right in the face and say thank you because you never know what lessons it has in store for you.
