Drafted on 12th &15th May,2008.
Accept your mistakes and be ready to change for the better. Most of the time, you commit many errors in your life, but you refuse to see that you are at fault. Sometimes, you even protest, quarrel, get annoyed, or fight when others point out your mistakes, hoping you will recognize them and improve. But this is not how it should be.
Knowing your
mistakes is one of the best habits you can adopt in your daily life. Learning
to recognize where you have gone wrong helps you grow not just physically, but
mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. This is because you make an effort not
to repeat the same mistake again. Mistakes, when acknowledged and reflected
upon, become powerful tools for self-development.
The mistakes
you make are sometimes due to your own desires. This happens because, deep
down, you might already know that what you're doing is not the right thing.
Yet, you go ahead with your actions because they align with what you want at
the moment. Then, when the outcome doesn’t match your expectations, you become
upset. You feel disappointed or even hurt not because you didn’t see it coming,
but because you ignored the truth in the first place. You failed to prepare
yourself for the consequences, and now the result has taken you by surprise.
Some mistakes
may also happen while you're trying to do something new, challenging, or
important. And this, I call an “opportunity for correction” or “a chance to
adopt a new strategy "one that can help you address problems that lie ahead. I
use this expression because the mistake you make can lead you to explore other
approaches, to think more deeply, or to act differently. In trying to solve it,
you might even discover something new, something you hadn’t thought of before.
That discovery could hold the key to both the original problem and future
success.
When we look at
it this way, we begin to understand that a mistake is not the end. It is often
the beginning of improvement. It’s a wake-up call, a redirection, or even a
gift in disguise, guiding us to do better than before.
It’s important
to remember that making a mistake does not make you a bad person. As John
Maxwell (2007) said, “A mistake is not a person; it is an event.” This quote
holds a deep truth. No matter how many times you fail, never allow yourself to
think or say that there's no need for correction. There is always room for
correction. Mistakes are not meant to shame us; they are meant to teach us. It
is not weak to admit a mistake it is wise.
Also, it is important not only to learn from your own mistakes but also from the mistakes of others. As Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t live long enough to make them all yourself.” This is a reminder that we should observe, listen, and reflect on what others have been through. Their failures can be lessons for us too. They can help us avoid pitfalls that might otherwise hold us back.
Mistakes,
therefore, are bound to happen. They are part of life. But it is up to us to do
our best to stop them from becoming harmful. Some mistakes can cost us time,
peace, or even relationships but if we deal with them early, learn from them,
and make changes, they can become stepping stones instead of stumbling blocks.
For every
mistake or problem, there is a solution. It may not come immediately, but with
reflection, effort, and humility, a way forward will always show itself. What
matters most is our attitude whether we choose to stay stuck in denial, or
whether we choose to rise, correct ourselves, and grow.
Author: Anthony Nana Yaw Dzacka
