Why it’s okay to get it wrong sometimes

I held an event recently that didn’t quite go to plan. I won’t bore you with the details, but the gods weren’t on my side — a number of things weren’t perfect, and it wasn’t as magical as I had wanted. It left me with a disappointed aftertaste — it’s hard when you put your energy and effort in to something and it doesn’t pay off as you’d like.

Up until a few years ago, I’d have given myself a hard time about what happened… that nasty little voice on my shoulder would have played the blame game. She’d pipe in with: “You’re an idiot — why didn’t you foresee that, why couldn’t you have done that differently… why did you even bother?”

Since reading “The Chimp Paradox”, I’m happy to say that I now have a much more positive relationship with that destructive voice (I lie… in reality I listened to the book; top tip: listening to personal development books is much more manageable). In the book Dr Steve Peters introduces this little voice as your “chimp”; your egotistical, insecure, irrational “animal” brain who hijacks us from time to time… it’s your chimp who gets FOMO when you’re not invited to that night out, who honks the horn when someone cuts you up, who gets jealous when you see your boyfriend talking to a pretty girl at a party.

I’m relieved to say that I now have a much healthier relationship with my chimp. It means that I can take a step back from situations and reflect, versus allowing myself to get tangled up in the web of self-hate that I used to so commonly feel. I try to “respond” rather than “react”.

Want to know what I’ve been telling my chimp since my sub-par event? Here, I’ll tell you;

1. If you don’t make mistakes you’re not trying hard enough

We’ve all heard this saying, right? Why? ‘Cos it’s fucking true! One of my favourite lessons from The Marketing Academy Scholarship is “get comfortable with feeling uncomfortable” — when you push yourself, stretch yourself, you’re creating a space for growth. You have to reach outside your comfort zone to learn — you don’t discover stuff when you play it safe. It might mean that sometimes you don’t get it completely right, especially if you’ve stretched too far. But by pushing yourself further, harder, you’re paving the way in to uncharted territory. And once you step into the unknown, you’ve taken a step forward and there’s no going back. It’s called progress.

2. You learn from your mistakes

Another age-old adage for a reason. You learn more from your failures than your successes. They hurt, you take them personally (at least I do), and you sure as fuck don’t want to make them again by repeating the same choices. I learnt a shit load from the things that went wrong with my event — the space was too big, it was scheduled for way too long… the list goes on. Next time I will know how not to make the same mistakes again, and I wouldn’t have known that if I hadn’t tried, and failed, the first time. If you can be reflective after making mistakes, you can make damn sure to correct them in future. You can just keep improving.

3. It’s the taking part, not the winning that counts

The very act of trying something, whether you succeed or not, is something to be proud of. There are plenty of people who are too afraid to put their head above the parapet and actually “do something”. Whatever happens, when you try you can give yourself a pat on the back for being brave enough to do it in the first place. And never forget that people will appreciate that about you too — if you do things with the right intentions, whether they go to plan or not, those around you will be grateful for the very act of you making an effort.

4. Nothing is unfixable

Even the biggest fuck-ups can be sorted out — ok, maybe not if you’re a surgeon and there’s a slip of the knife, but for most like me (who sell takeaway for a living) everything can fixed. It just takes you being honest with yourself, taking responsibility and doing everything you can to resolve the situation quickly. People respect people who are accountable and truthful — you can get away with a hell of a lot when you admit your mistakes, do everything you can to fix them, and take the lessons on board from what happened.

My Mum tells a story about how she learnt from me about it being ok to get it wrong sometimes. I was three years old and managed to ruin a painting by smearing it with brown paint. I was inconsolable at having screwed it up. And she said to me; “Alice darling, it’s ok… you had the best intentions and you can try again.” She says in that moment she realised that if she truly believed that it was ok for me to make a mistake — which she did — then she had to live by those rules herself. So, if you ever fuck up and get it wrong, ask yourself: “What would I think if this had happened to someone else?” Would I vilify them, or would I think, ‘c’est la vie, shit happens, and they meant well.’” It would be the latter, right?

Next time you mess up, don’t beat yourself up. Reflect like you’re in someone else’s shoes, bank the learnings, brush yourself off and get on with making the next mistake ;)