Tag: MISTAKES

3 Common Mistakes Smart People Make

OOPS!

If you believe that only stupid people make these common mistakes, you’re as wrong as I was. The truth is that everyone makes mistakes. Smart people admit that. Stupid people do not.

What’s more, the smartest and most successful people in history have made the most mistakes. Are those two things connected? I think so. This Albert Einstein quote says it all:

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”

I used to blame myself for making mistakes in life. I think that’s how our society is. As a kid, you’re punished for making mistakes in school and life. And because of that, we think it’s normal to punish each other as adults.

But why would you punish yourself or another person for making silly mistakes? Most things in life are reversible and small (I’m not talking about committing crimes or adultery here). What matters is that we learn from our mistakes.

One of the best traits one can have in life is to be forgiving. You must go easy on yourself when you screw up. The same is true for the people in our lives. Alexander Pope put it best:

“To err is human, to forgive, divine.”

And when people really cross the line—just move on. No need to make things complicated.

In life, there are lines one should not cross. If you keep yourself to a high moral standard, you’re doing the right thing. And if you make mistakes? So what? No one is perfect.

Here are 5 of those mistakes that smart people make. Remember that you don’t have to make these mistakes yourself. It’s better to learn from other people’s mistakes. They have made them, so we don’t have to.

1. Chasing money

I recently read How To Get Rich by Felix Dennis, who owned one of the biggest magazine publishers in the UK. Contrary to the title, the book actually tries to discourage you to chase money.

Many rich people will tell you the same. The funny thing is that we all know there is more to life than money. And yet, we make it our sole purpose. Dennis writes:

“People who get trapped in the tunnel vision of making money think that is all there is to life.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to get rich. We just have to remind ourselves that making money beyond a certain amount has little impact on our happiness. But somehow, we get tunnel vision. Again, trying to get rich is not a mistake. However, it is a mistake if you expect that it’s the answer to all your problems.

2. Ignoring sleep

When you get excited about something, you want to spend all your time on it. That’s a great feeling.

But when your excitement prevents you from having quality sleep, you want to change that. It’s one of my biggest pitfalls. I can read and work all day long—well into the night.

But even when I go to bed at 2 AM and wake up 8 hours later, I still feel tired. Somehow, it’s different when I hit the sack at 11 and wake up at 7. I feel much more energized.

For the past year, I’ve been taking my sleep more seriously. I wake up at the same time every morning. And I turn off my devices exactly one hour before I want to sleep. That means no work or heavy mental activity before bedtime. Just some light reading or journaling.

3. Being connected too much

The past decade has been great for technology. Almost everyone has a smartphone with access to the internet. Within a few years, the whole world will be connected. Even the less developed countries.

Modern technology has changed the world. These developments are great. But remember that too much of a good thing becomes bad.

That also applies to your smartphone, tablet, and laptop. Recent research shows that Generation Z (born after 1995) is distressed and anxious. The American Psychological Association even says they have “the worst mental health of any generation.”

One of the biggest reasons for their mental state? All the signs point towards their smartphones and connectedness. For years, I’ve been limiting my smartphone usage.

And inspired by Cal Newport’s new book, Digital Minimalism, I’m only getting more strict with this.

FIRING THE BLAME BULLET

The popular game PUBG has weapon attachments that reduces weapon recoil. It makes life easier for the players. Recoil is the backward movement of a gun when a bullet is discharged. It is helpful to know which attachments help players to shoot better and more effectively without hurting themselves in the process due to the tremendous force at which the shots are fired.

In real life when we point the gun at someone, how badly are we affected?

Well fortunately for us, in India, there exists some tight Gun laws except for the water guns’ kids play with during Holi and Gangsters. Hence here I talk about the abstract gun which fires the Bullets of Blame on others. Pointing finger at anybody who is in sight, was my favorite thing to do in any situation.

The blaming gun can also point upwards or inwards. When it points upwards, we blame the Creator for being unintelligent or uncaring or even non-existent. When it points inwards, we beat ourselves down with self-recrimination, “I am good-for-nothing,” ending up unnecessarily with inferiority complex.

How many of you, like me; are blamers? How many of you, when something goes wrong, the first thing you want to know is whose fault it is? Well Hello there, I’m the former winner of the Miss Blamer Pageant and the magnitude to which I blamed others with respect to everything that went wrong in my life was comical.

I’m in my house. I have on white slacks and a pink sweater. I’m drinking a full cup of coffee in my kitchen. I drop it on the tiled floor. It goes into a million pieces and splashes up all over me. And a millisecond after it hit the floor, right out of my mouth comes this: “DAMN YOU CHINA!” For purposefully making these cups so shiny and slippery. Now my entire kitchen is infected by the tiny pieces of ceramic (China clay). The kitchen has to be quarantined until I clean it up…or somebody else cleans it up, never mind.

Now as I have aged, I realized- I’d rather it be my fault than no one’s fault. BUT WHY? Cause it gives me some semblance of control. Blame is simply the discharging of discomfort and pain. It has an inverse relation with accountability. What is the difference? Well accountability by definition is a vulnerable process wherein I confide to you, “Hey my feelings were really hurt by the things you said/did.” Blaming is simply a way to express anger.

People who blame a lot seldom have the tenacity and grit to actually hold people accountable because we spend all of our energy raging for 15 seconds and figuring out whose fault something is. Blaming’s very corrosive in relationships and it’s one of the reasons we miss our opportunities for empathy. Because when something happens and we hear the story, we’re not really listening, we’re in the place where I was – making the connections as quickly as we can about whose fault it was.

SO, DO I START BLAMING MYSELF FOR EVERYTHING?!

In the spiritual path, self-blame is the most dangerous thing. Firstly, stop blaming yourself and others. We don’t have to point the gun at others or our own heads. Let us drop the gun and never pick it up, ever again.

Secondly, we need to come out of the Destiny’s Illusion. Never focus on what you can’t do, focus on what you can do. If we keep on focusing on what we can do- Then even if you believe in destiny, it will be a good one for you. Blaming your destiny will close doors to all the wonderful opportunities waiting for you.

A child runs a race with his full speed & energy and yet comes last in it. Losing the race was not his fault but taking part in the wrong race is definitely a mistake worth correcting. To simplify- Making a mistake is not your fault but doing it without your interest in it, is a mistake that can be rectified.

To solve the problem, we need; not a blaming bullet, but a helping hatchet. Not a blaming finger but a helping hand. Making mistake is in our nature. Acceptance of mistake shows our culture and correcting the mistake is progress. I do accept that spilling that damn coffee was my fault, however damn you CHINA for making the cup which broke and spread on the entire floor leaving my kitchen dangerous to walk on freely. * Gun drop * I meant MIC DROP…..phew!