Mistakeless

Chapter 360

"The only man who never makes mistakes, is the man who never does anything." ~ Theodore Roosevelt

I make lots of mistakes and those don’t bother me so much, its when I repeat mistakes that it bothers me a lot. Oh and when you point out that I made a mistake bothers me a lot. But Roosevelt and we have this wrong, the mistakes aren’t even the issue nor the focus, getting stuff done, learning new stuff, trying to change the world, those are the things that are important.

We get so obsessed with the mistakes or the failures or the blunders, that we distract ourselves completely from the meaty and important matters. Where did we ever get the idea that people ever want to be mistake free, that this is a desired state of being? Who decided that we wanted to even try to be a person who never makes mistakes? Of course the President here is trying to diminish the importance of mistakes, and encourage people to get things done, but I wish he focused his statement around the doing. Said something like “Get out there and change the world, mistakes be damned.” Or “Go big or go home, and what is a little ole’ mistake.” Or “Reach far and attempt more and accomplish the impossible, while others sit at home and fear mistakes.”

You should try this - pithy statements are hard to write well. But the point is that words are important and you can move mountains with the words you craft or tell yourself. So focus on the important ones.