Hi,
Finally, the last new reminder! Thanks for reading, and we’ll be back sometime next year to review any of the wisdom I accumulate in 2020.
-It fails because of you
This one came about one day while I was reflecting on the consequences for being myself. One insight I had during this reflection was how the nature of failure changed the more I was being true to myself. If I made a mistake when I was doing something unnatural to my personality, I could write it off as a fluke, something not representative of my true self. But I screwed up doing something native to me, there was a finality to it, and an inevitability that if the chance came up again I would probably repeat the mistake.
We’ve all heard the expression ‘learn from your mistakes’. I used to think this was a process-oriented concept, one where we learn how to do something better for next time. But there is a lot more learning involved when we learn about ourselves. In many ways, a mistake is a mirror held up to our nature - look long enough and it becomes hard to distinguish reflection from destiny. Newly armed with the knowledge of the inevitable, perhaps we should settle for learning how to avoid the same situation next time.
It may come as a surprise that I found this thought to be soothing. That’s the truth, though. All I can really do is be myself but that’s no guarantee of a problem-free life. If anything, being myself is going to ensure particular screw-ups unique to my personal blend of skills, personality, and shortcomings. This reminder helps me keep the fact in my mind whenever I feel pressure to abandon my convictions or ideals for the sake of a short-term success. If it doesn’t work because of me, that’s OK, because the price of getting it to work is too high.
