"Mistakes may be categorized into three: mistakes in what we do, mistakes of who we are, and mistakes that violate who we want to be.
To learn from each type of mistakes involves varying degrees of personal pain."
- Learn from your mistakes.
Learning from your mistakes is one of the things that is easier said than done. To truly learn from the mistakes you commit, you need to closely scrutinize them. This exercise can be both difficult and painful.
After being denied the promotion she felt she deserves, Myrna quit her job as bank manager and started her own lending company. With a noble intention of financing small entrepreneurs who have difficulty acquiring capital, she granted loans to her clients indiscriminately. One year later, she went bankrupt. Accepting her failure and concluding that her experience taught her that she does not have the qualities of a successful businesswoman, she looked for employment again and got hired. Myrna's candid assessment of her bankruptcy is not the kind that brings about personal growth.
In one of the leadership seminars that I attended, the approach of Major Doug Crandall (West Point, NY) in learning from failure was discussed and I would like to share his approach here as I remember it from that seminar. He categorized mistakes into three: mistakes in what we do, mistakes of who we are, and mistakes that violate who we want to be. To learn from each type of mistakes involves varying degrees of personal pain.
Making an investment and then losing money is a mistake in what you do. You made a bad decision. The consequences of mistakes in what you do may be great, but these errors are usually easy to deal with and learn from because they hit you only on the surface and the learning relates to the improvement of knowledge and skills. However, what you do are just the packaging of who you are. Perhaps, when you decided to make an investment, you were being impulsive or stubborn or gullible. Your actions and decisions are wired to your personal traits and emotions, thus intertwined with mistakes in what you do are mistakes of who you are.
Before you can learn from a mistake, you will need to acknowledge it. While mistakes in what you do are obvious because of the consequences of your actions, the mistakes of who you are rarely readily apparent and you need to find them out. You will need to take a hard look at yourself, to ask for inputs from others, to be open to criticisms, and to diagnose your needs for improvement. This can be painful because this requires admission of imperfection, of having certain peculiarities, weaknesses and negative qualities that you probably were not aware of. To avoid pain, some people including myself at times, tend to deny or make excuses or justify or blame others. Acknowledging your weaknesses is not enough, though. You also need to establish a commitment to personal excellence. You need to develop self-awareness then find ways to strengthen your character. You need to become aware of the impact of your words and actions on the people you interact with. You need to make your self accessible encouraging people to talk to you openly and without fear. If you are aware of how your behaviors impact others, you become open to a continuing process of self-development.
Mistakes that violate who you want to be are departures from your deeply held principles and core values or purpose in life. Assessments of these kind of mistakes are most difficult but are powerfully developmental.
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