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Ok, I'm going to come out and say it. [deep breath].
My name is Douglas Cartwrightand I ama MISTAKE MAKER.
Rounds of applause and cries of Cmon Doug
[Wiping away a few tears]
Let me tell you my story
When I was little, I explored everything. I put my hands in dirt, ate grass, and shouted No at my parents. I let snot run down my nose, and I scribbled on valuable books.
Life was wonderful.
But then it all changed.
People started shouting at me as I explored. Wrong! Naughty.
Shame!
I was told in front of the class that my work was not good enough. They made me feel.bad
And eventually I came to learn thatnot getting it right was. BAD
So I grew up afraid to make a mistake. Until now!
I RECLAIM MY RIGHT TO BE WRONG!
Cheers
I STUBBORNLY DEFEND MY RIGHT TO BE WRONG!
People standing up and giving a standing ovation!
I AM HUMAN!!
Audience goes wild.
Ok, this is a little bit surreal but I'm making a point here. There are certain things that come along with being human. Things like:
The need to worship something
Breathing
Hunger
Sleeping
Talking
Sexual desire
AND
Getting things wrong!
There's an old English saying which goes: To err is human [Theres a second part which I'll come to]
Without even going into the technical aspects of how human beings make mistakes, we just do. Hardly rocket science. But sometimes it seems like I live in some strange unreality where people are expected to not get things wrong!
We DO have an amazing ability to make deductions- and look at the technological and scientific inventions that characterise our age.
But thinking skills are not generally taught in school and by the time were adults were adopted a myriad of mistaken assumptions about people, and how the world works, and even the nature of own thinking to delete, distort and generalise our perceptions and evaluations.
Were LIMITED. Were not God.
Forgive me if you think the above statement is patronising but if you look at the number of people who utterly freak out at the thought of getting something wrong or not perfect you could be forgiven for asking them if they expected to be HIM. J
Every human being has some cognitive distortions in their thinking. It is just part of BEING HUMAN. Sometimes we infer on the basis of emotion, sometimes we predict awful things that will never happen and sometimes we fail to count what has happened. Every system has natural limitations and our thinking styles are fallible.
We make false assumptions, inferences, blame people for our own feelings and a hundred other things!
The good news is we can learn about many of these limitations in thinking and because we are able to meta-cognate - think about our own thoughts - we can make better decisions by asking ourselves: What did I miss?
Of course, I realise its all very well saying this and there can be a lot of pain and distress associated with not wanting to get things wrong. It can tear you up inside, contribute to social phobia, and generally cripple a person from being more assertive when it would be to their own benefit.
So what else can you do?
Believe it or not, one thing I've found that really works is to have a chat with yourself about what you think about failure, being wrong etc.
If you actually take a moment to think about failure, locate the source of the feelings in your mind and body, then ask those feelings:
Will you speak to me?
What do you want?
If you get that, what do you want thats even more important than that?
How do you want me to give that to you?
If the idea of talking to your feelings seems ridiculous let me assure you then when I ask clients If you're feelings could talk, what would they say? they do understand what I am asking. Play along, and you'll be surprised!
Ive found that these inner parts (metaphorically speaking) can often tell you what you need in order to grow in a certain area. It may be a change in behaviour you can make yourself. You may need to learn some NLP, or have some coaching.
However, the exciting thing is that once you can learn to embrace mistakes as key to the learning process you can begin to get curious and excited about what lies beyond them.
If you know how, you can even redefine what mistakes mean to you. I like what Ralph Waldo Emerson said:
"Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
US essayist & poet (1803 - 1882)
I won't lie to you. There are a myriad of reasons why people struggle with feeling bad about making mistakes and the above won't work for everyone.
It can be to do with their frames of reference, their memories, the way theyve defined their concepts, and the above mentioned cognitive distortions.
A good coach can really help you to redefine and integrate mistake making into your overall life strategy and make it a positive force. Yes, your mistakes can work for you.
Remember, penicillin was discovered when mould had been left to grow on a culture dish!
If Alexander Flemming had not asked himself What is this, and what does it do? - would we have that medicine now?
But until that time, heres the other side of the To err is human quote.
It's but to forgive is divine.
Can you forgive yourself for being only human? Its ok you know.
Or perhaps you need to stand up and state:
I'M ENOUGH OF A HUMAN TO EMBRACE ALL THAT I AM - WITH MY LIMITS AND MY STRENGTHS.
There may not be an external crowd to cheer you. But you might hear a cheer from within.
To your highest
Douglas Cartwright
Douglas Cartwright is a meta-coach whose speciality is helping professionals who procrastinate get unstuck and start taking action.
If you want to know more about what Living Words does go please go to http://www.livingwords.net and sign up for the free e-books on coaching. If it's products for getting unstuck then go to http://www.livingwords.net/products.html
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