Learning From Mistakes the Half-Full Way: A 4 Step Approach

As someone who is always trying to "deal with the literal world in a positive way", I have come to really appreciate the mistakes I've made (and there have been plenty).   

Now I'm sure your reaction to that is - "appreciate mistakes??" Sounds like an oxymoron, doesn't it?

In my half-full world, the ability to take positive things out of the errors I make is critical to making my life's journey a fulfilling one (and, in a more "ground level" way, my business career a successful one).  I've found that there are four important steps I need to make to leverage those mistakes properly:

1. Acknowledgment
2. Correction
3. Learning
4. Rear View Mirror

Let's take a closer look at these steps - first, there's acknowledgment.   The simple admission, to others and most importantly to yourself, that you made a mistake.

I remember back in 1999 and 2000 when I thought I was the best stock day trader in the world. I had an E-trade account and was wheeling and dealing like a Wall Street pro - or so I thought.   When the tech bubble burst around that time I refused to believe I had erred by taking so many positions in risky dot-com companies.   I didn't bail out in time because I didn't acknowledge my mistake. I was too proud to admit that day trading was something I shouldn't be doing. I learned a valuable lesson from this - you have to have the self-awareness to know when you've made an error.

Next comes correction.   After you've admitted a mistake it needs to be fixed.   This one is most important in my business world.   We provide a service, and sometimes we don't get it right the first time.   We have to quickly respond and get the customer happy.   There's a great silver lining to this, one that really contributes to the ultimate benefit of errors - it's a documented fact that a customer who had a bad experience but it was fixed to their satisfaction is much more likely to be a loyal customer than someone who never had a problem.   

Talk about making lemonade out of lemons!  So once you know you've gone wrong, correct it as soon as you can.

Then there's the learning that comes from mistakes.   This always reminds me of that great saying "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" by George Santayana.  The lessons I've taken from my errors have been without a doubt the most valuable learnings of my life.

The biggest mistake I've made in my career, for example, was to decide to make a cross-country move to work for someone I was just not compatible with from a leader/manager standpoint.   I've written in my blog about how I had to pull myself out of that situation to get my "mojo" back, but the other thing I took away from it were two great lessons -  I was never going to put myself in that kind of work situation again, and better still, because of the mistake I now knew exactly the kind of leader I wanted to be and the kind of business environment I wanted to be in.

Yes, we have to learn from those mistakes we make, or we will indeed repeat them.

Lastly, while we need to take the time to reflect on the lessons from our mistakes, once that is done and we've absorbed the learning, we must let the mistake itself go, or what I call "put it in the rear view mirror".  Why?  because if we don't we can become paralyzed because of the fear of making another mistake.  This isn't the easiest thing to do sometimes - there have been occasions for me where I would be poised to do something and all of a sudden the memory of a past error (and its consequences) would flash in my head, and I would hesitate.   Most of the time I can stifle it, but there are still occasions when I can't.

But I try to learn from that too - it's a constant and consistent desire that keeps driving me forward.  I need to learn. I HAVE to learn.

I hope that this 4-step approach that's come from my life experiences can help you with your learning too, and as you use them, be joyful, jubilant and brave!

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Terry Starbucker is an operations executive for a service company who lives in Connecticut, loves business trips to the Rocky Mountain west, and posts his musings and observations about "the optimistic side of the daily grind" in Ramblings from a Glass Half Full. 

Comments

[Steve Sherlock]

"Appreciating mistakes"... Now, there is a phrase that can travel miles....

Thanks Terry!

[tim]

Love the "rear view mirror" analogy Terry. Imagine trying to drive your car by only looking at the rearview mirror.

Even though it's in front of you, it only shows what's behind you. The windshield is a lot bigger and opens up a lot more possibilities.

Of course, we still need the rear view mirror, but we don't move forward by looking into it.

[Terry Starbucker]

Hi Steve and Tim - I hope you both are doing well, and thanks for your comments.

Steve, that phrase HAS traveled miles! :-)

Tim, I loved the way you expanded on my analogy of the rear view mirror - that's exactly the point of view I was aiming for.

All the best to you both!

[Rosa Say]

This is terrific Terry; 4 good steps we can all use to love our mistakes for the learning they deliver to us. And it needn't be a lonely exercise - we can use what you propose to set up some safe "mis-take? re-take!" factories in the workplace.

Mistakes are waaay cool; if we aren't making them we're playing it too safe, and settling for actions that fall way short of BIG IDEA potential.

[April Groves]

Terry, I am a particular fan of 3 & 4. 1& 2 seem to just happen and get caught up in the frenzy of life - I am thankful that those things are somewhat hard wired...

But 3&4 is where it is at for me...that's where I find that appreciation you so smartly speak of. Learn from it, digest it, and let go of the guilt...anything else is time and opportunity wasted.

This post is very motivating to me as I strive each day to do it scared!

[Terry Starbucker]

Hi Rosa and April - thanks for your comments.

Rosa, you are so right, this doesn't have to be a lonely practice. At my workplace I actively encourage group learning from the errors we make (rather than finger pointing excercises, which are such a waste of time).

April, I'm glad this was of help to you in your learning journey - that's what JJL is all about. I was long overdue for a post, so I wanted to make it a good one.

All the best to you both!