Mistakes - No Reason For Self-Criticism

I Get It -Finally!

Photo by Ries Bosch on Unsplash

I didn’t use to be self-critical, but living alone after being married for 63 years left me doubting and unconfident - something I was not expecting. As a result, I’m more compassionate with a friend than I am with myself lately.

The past three years have brought many life changes and challenges.

• My 85-year-old body is aging - despite my best efforts

• I’m a single woman for the first time in my life

• Life is changing at a fast pace in various ways

• I’m responsible for more and need to learn new skills

Logically, I know self-criticism is unfair - it takes time to readjust, change, and create new habits. In previous articles, I’ve written about my attempts to be kinder to myself and tried strategies, such as looking for the lessons learned and thinking of new or challenging tasks as experiments. But with not a lot of success thus far.

However, a quote from this FootLoose Muse article helped change my mindset, finally.

Mistakes often carry a negative connotation—they’re seen as setbacks, failures, or dead ends. But what if we viewed them differently? What if we saw mistakes as opportunities for innovation, as creative detours that lead to unexpected discoveries?

The MindTools website agrees.

To err is human, and we don't have to punish ourselves for our mistakes. They can be great opportunities to learn and to develop on a personal level. We just need to learn from them and put that learning into practice.

Oh!!!

An article on the Forbes website explains my current thinking well.

Mistakes are inevitable, and failing is part of the human experience. The key is to acknowledge when you make a mistake, learn from it, and move on — to understand that failure and mistakes are opportunities for learning, feedback, and creativity.

My New Thinking

Mistakes will occur as I settle into this chapter of my life, encounter new challenges, and live independently. Expect them as part of the learning process.

So, do it, learn what works and doesn’t without criticism, and tweak the results until they are acceptable. Then, practice the successsful version until it’s ingrained. It may not happen overnight or on the first try, though.

The poem, It Is What It Is, in the newsletter

Footnotes from the Flipside

leads the way.

This change in thinking allows me to be kinder to myself and appreciate my efforts. The more significant mistake would be if I didn’t try.

P. S. I’d love to have you share the Aging Well Newsletter with others. I want to bring the lessons I’ve learned through my years of life and caregiving to as many people as possible. More than anything, I want to continue to expand our community of readers.

So please forward this email to a friend and invite them to join us. They can subscribe here:

Thank you for being part of the Aging Well community.

If you want to contribute to my work, consider donating to the Alzheimer's Association. This link takes you to their website. The choice is yours.