Mistakes Were Made
Recently someone close to me thanked me for showing them the gift of learning found in being wrong. The right way to be wrong isn’t simple and requires practice. This is my effort to explain an inherent process for me about the correct way to be incorrect.
The commonly used corporate and political statement mistakes were made is a fascinating linguistic device. Mistakes becomes an abstract, which in this delivery means nobody specifically has to take implicit accountability for their actions and no accusation is made. This language is built into the psychology of the individual and group using it. I’ve never aspired to learn that trick and assume it’s probably harder to unlearn than learn.
Being wrong is one of life's opportunities to learn. Simply learning can bring new awareness in your life, however being wrong offers you an opportunity to see your own preconception at odds with a new understanding. Being wrong is a mirror that you choose to see your reflection. The risk is reflections can be scary and uncomfortable.
Being wrong is a core tenet of my life and career. The openness of being wrong is a practice I’ve both remained open to and had foisted on me at an early age. At first being wrong can feel like the end of the world. I might have kept something from a friend because I risked looking bad or feeling ashamed of my lack of skill in an area. Then I would dread seeing them again, not because we didn’t get along, but because of the risk of being wrong. What if I said something unkind to a friend on the playground about their new shoes and walked away, then the next day dread seeing them on that very playground knowing the weight of my violence. This is obviously a metaphor for our current situations as adults. Could the majority of corporate bureaucracy and personal hang ups come from this analogy of holding on to our need to be right? My choice then as it still is today was to offer my intention to them and learn about how they saw and experienced that moment so we might learn.
Perception is a human super power. We can look at the same cloud in the sky and see multiple anthropomorphized versions of its shape. We could use this same perception power to invade a foreign country for their land or place our beliefs on someone we invest time in. No one ever wants to be wrong.
Being wrong with the intent to learn from the discomfort is a skill. That skill allows us to engage with those with and without similar beliefs and experiences of the world and see their lessons with a sharper wit. Mistakes have been made by me and I’m in a world made completely different from the one without any. I wouldn’t want it any other way.