It's okay to make mistakes

Everyone makes mistakes. The main difference is that successful people learn from them and unsuccessful people don’t.

1. Mistakes are a natural part of the evolutionary process

If you don’t mind being wrong on the way to being right, you’ll learn a lot — and increase your effectiveness. Jeff Bezos described it as “You have to have a willingness to repeatedly fail. If you don’t have the willingness to fail, you’re going to have to be very careful, not to invent.”

2. Don’t worry about looking good — Worry about achieving your goals.

Put your insecurities away and get on with achieving your goals. Reflect and remind yourself that accurate criticism is the most valuable feedback that you can receive. Imagine how silly and unproductive it would be to respond to your spouse if she was blaming you when she told you that you are not a good cook because you missed adding the tomatoes in a tomato soup.

3. Observe the patterns of mistakes to see if they are products of weakness

Everyone has weaknesses and they are generally revealed in the patterns of mistakes they make. The fastest path to success starts with knowing what your weaknesses are and staring hard at them. Start by writing down your mistakes and connecting the dots between them. Then write down your one big challenge. the weakness that stands the most in the way of getting what you want. Everyone has at least one big challenge. The first step in tackling these impediments is getting them out into the open.

4. Reflect when you experience pain

If you want to evolve, you need to go where the problems and pain are. By confronting the pain, you will see more clearly the problems you face. Reflecting on them and resolving them will give you wisdom. Psychologists call this “Hitting bottom”. Try to face your fear and overcome it by doing it again and again. For eg. At one point in my life, I was not great at making presentations and use to feel nervous when it comes to addressing the crowd. I decided to do it again and again and finally made it my strength. The harder the pain and the challenge, the better. If you keep doing this, you will convert the pain of facing mistakes and weaknesses into pleasure and get to the next level.

5. Knowing what type of mistakes are acceptable

While considering the kind of mistakes you are willing to allow in order to promote learning through trial and error, it's also important to weigh the potential damage of a mistake against the benefit of incremental learning. For eg. I’m willing to let you scratch or dent your car, but I won’t put you in a situation where there is a significant risk of your totaling it.