The best way to improve at anything in life is by learning from mistakes you’ve made. Mistakes commonly have a negative connotation and many people overlook the growth that can stem from making a mistake.
Learning from your mistakes requires a slight mindset shift. This shift will allow you to embrace your mistakes and make a plan to avoid making the same mistake. The best part is that these ideas can be applied to all aspects of your life.
This article is going to be all about learning from mistakes and the best approach to take after making a mistake.
Learning From Mistakes
Making mistakes is essentially unavoidable when you are trying new things. Oftentimes, mistakes are seen to be negative, but it is important to reframe your thinking. Making mistakes gives you the perfect opportunity to be able to correct exactly what went wrong and improve it the next time around. Without trying and making a mistake, it is almost impossible to correctly guess where you will need to improve.
Throughout this process, it can be easy to be hard on yourself. To find success, it is important to be honest with yourself but also be very kind to yourself. Mistakes happen all the time, but the important thing is that you don’t make the same mistake twice. Avoiding making the same mistake twice should be your main focus when going through this process.
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1. Note Your Mistakes
Taking note of your mistakes sounds very simple, but you should try to take it to the next level. If something isn’t working, you probably realize that you made a mistake somewhere, but the exact mistake might not be obvious.
For example, if you’re baking bread and it doesn’t rise like you expected, you should take a step back. Maybe this happened because it was in an environment that was too hot or too cold. Maybe you missed an ingredient. Or maybe it was a combination of things. In this case, you should do some research to learn more about what could have gone wrong knowing that your problem was with the bread rising.
If you’re in a situation like this where you’re not able to determine exactly what the mistake is, you can still use it to your advantage. Continue with the following steps, but consider multiple possible mistakes that you can improve. In the case of the bread not rising, you might find out that there were not any mistakes made with the ingredients, but it is still worth considering all possible mistakes that could’ve created your problem.
Remember, it is still beneficial that you made an attempt at making the bread because now you know which part you struggle with. In this example, had you continued to research rather than actually try, you wouldn’t know which area to focus on.
Keep in mind there are many other areas you succeeded in that you won’t have to do additional research on. For example, you didn’t struggle to shape the bread or get the bread to cook evenly.
2. Accept and Analyze Your Mistakes
Once you’ve established what your mistake was, you should accept it. This can be a scary thing to do, but it will be the easiest way to work through it.
You should keep in mind that by following these steps, you will not make the same mistake again. Hopefully, it will be easier for you to accept the mistake knowing that you will form a plan to prevent it from happening again.
It is also important to analyze your mistakes. This is where you should consider why this mistake was made. Maybe you weren’t as careful as you should have been. Maybe you simply didn’t know about something you were supposed to do. Or maybe you forgot something. There are so many possibilities, so it is important to hone in on the cause of the mistake.
3. Use Another Perspective
Once you determine the reason for your mistake, you may naturally start to give yourself a hard time. To avoid this, try to look at it from another perspective. Instead of looking at the mistake as a reason for not succeeding, think of it as a shortcut to learning exactly what to improve so that you can succeed in the future. This mindset will turn your mistake into something positive.
4. Create Your Plan of Action
By identifying the cause of your mistake, you can create a specific plan to ensure that you will not make the same mistake. This plan of action doesn’t need to be very complex. Honestly, the simpler the plan, the easier it will be to follow.
To avoid overcomplicating this plan of action, start by making sure you’re answering the question: What should I do differently? Answering this question is all you need for your plan of action.
Considering the bread example from above, you will have a couple of different plans of action for each possible mistake. To start, you will make sure that you reread the ingredients carefully when combining everything to ensure you don’t make a mistake.
In addition, you will do additional research to determine the optimal environment for the bread to rise. Next, you will make sure that your bread is at the optimal temperature when rising.
5. Apply the Changes
Once you’ve come up with a plan to avoid your previous mistakes, it’s time to apply the changes. When doing this, you might need to use extra focus, especially if you’re trying to break a habit. This is important because the last thing you want to do is make the same mistake another time, but this is very likely if you’re not intentional with your changes.
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6. Keep Track of Your Progress
Keeping track of your progress can be extremely motivating and can have some other benefits. For example, if you’re trying to solve a problem where you’re not sure exactly what your mistake is, this is where you can ensure you try each option. You should take note of which mistake you attempted to rectify and the result. By the end of solving each mistake, you should have solved your problem.
Remember to be kind to yourself through this process. You will learn more quickly from your mistakes than if you try to get everything perfect the first time around.
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I hope this article gave you more confidence in learning from your mistakes! If you have any comments or questions, leave them below or reach out to ourteam@wellroundedyou.com.
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