Mistakes Turn Into Experience
Some people are so frightened about making mistakes that they rarely reach beyond their comfort zone. They are frozen in time, in geography, in personal growth, and in the way they perceive things.
There are most likely psychological explanations for why those people are the way that they are. It is my observation that most people have a touch of that kind of behavior: morning routines after getting out of bed; the stagnant drive to work; menus; TV preferences; the way in which they acknowledge or ignore others; and the list goes on.
I’ve heard that there are many people who live in Manhattan, who were born there, and have never left the island. For me that’s hard to imagine. I’m by no means a world traveler, but in today’s world, in the USA, I’d expect almost everyone to have at least visited a neighboring State (but I guess that New Jersey doesn’t exactly have an intoxicating attraction).
Newbies don’t want to look bad or foolish. They stick with that which they know for certain. That precludes them from playing 95% of the words in the dictionary. Even after we first learn things we are usually apprehensive about our new knowledge until we have used it a time or two, to gain some confidence. That’s why, after learning new words, I believe that we should go out of our way to play them. Playing words helps cement them into our memory. If we error and play a phoney, we may be caught by a challenge and lose a turn, but that’s part of the game. And whether we played the word correctly or not, it is part of the learning experience.
I’ll admit it here. I’ve made my share of mistakes in my lifetime. And those experiences have taught me lessons. But if you look at the long, long list of people who have made mistakes on life’s journey toward knowing and greatness, I’m in very good company.
Be willing to make a Mistake today . . . then learn from it.