Embrace Imperfection: Mistakes Are Essential For Your Growth

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To all you perfectionists out there, I have bad news: It’s impossible to be perfect throughout this human experience.  You are going to mess up sometimes. 

There will be little mistakes and also big ones.  Guaranteed.  Add one more to the list of life’s certainties:  death, taxes AND mistakes!  Since it’s inevitable, why not accept it?  Take it one step further and even embrace it!

What if you could shift your perspective to see mistakes as being not only natural, but also an essential part of the growth process?  What if the whole purpose of being human was to learn through trial and error? 

If you always did everthing perfectly from start to finish, the chart of your life would be a flat line.  No growth.  You would not be much different from a machine.  Everything would happen as you already knew it would.  There would be no spontaneity, no surprises.

Where’s the fun in that?

The thrill of being alive comes from the unexpected.  Taking a step and not knowing where it will take you.  Sometimes it will lead you somewhere amazing.  Other times you will fall flat on your face.   Expect that.  It’s part of the growth process.  

Once you accept that there will be missteps, it’s much easier to pick yourself up after a fall and have a laugh about it.  Then the next time you will step around or try walking in a different direction.  That’s growth!

Isn’t growth part of your life purpose?  Everyone is so different and yet the underlying essence of whatever you’re trying to achieve is growth.  Whether you want to grow your bank account or grow your heart to love more, you have to experiment through trial and error to break the barrier of where you’re at now and level up. 

That seeming failure gives you fresh insight that was inaccessible before that experience.  It’s not enough to intellectualize something and live in your head.  You learn through the visceral experience.  Who are you going to trust more: the doctor who got the best exam scores but hasn’t had contact with patients, or the one who also did a couple years of residency?

 It’s not really a mistake if you learn from it. 

Turn lemons into lemonade by embracing mistakes graciously and growing from the experience.  Your life will be transformed!