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
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.
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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.
You're speaking my language as usual, Janice. Our situations are so similar and so are our fears. I've made plenty of mistakes since Ed died. (Not that I didn't before...) So many, I'm getting way too cautious. I'm constantly trying to come to terms with my place here and my time left., and I'm not having enough fun. No great experiences, no thrilling chance-takers, nothing.
This move took all the effort I could manage. I'm happy here, but not entirely satisfied. I'm staying home too much when there are endless possibilities around here.
Every lingering pain signals the possibility of a life-changing event. Is this the beginning of the end?
And then I resolve to live each day fully since I don't know how many are left.
Living fully and being afraid to make mistakes will almost certainly clash, so I most often opt NOT to live all that fully and just plod along, hoping for the best.
I'm driving myself mad!
So here I am, reading what you've written here and promising myself to do better.
Thank you. I needed this. Again. ❤️