Making mistakes

Everyone makes mistakes.  It's part of the human condition.  Nobody's perfect.  Maybe it's not even unique to humans.  I bet if we observed animals long enough we'd see them make mistakes too.  Even our DNA makes mistakes (i.e., mutations).  Thus, we are falliable to our very core.

We spend a lot of time and energy thinking about mistakes - how to prevent them, how to fix them, how to learn from them, etc.  Some of this is time well spent.  If mistakes are inevitable we can at least try to learn from them.  Failure sucks but it sometimes teaches valuable lessons. 

It's not hard to put a positive spin on screwing things up.  Still, there are some very unfortunate truths about making mistakes that can be difficult for us to accept:

1. Once mistakes are made you can't undo them:  This is, of course, true for any course of action.  Once a thing is done it is done.  You cannot go back in time and change it.  Nothing is gained by continuing to dwell on past mistakes.  I've had patients who are still beating themselves up about things that happened years ago - perhaps even as children.  They all have their own reasons for doing this.  The result for all of them, however, is the same: they all feel terrible.  They carry the weight of guilt and shame with them everywhere they go.  Eventually, they begin to condemn themselves and then to hate themselves.  That's not to say we should not feel guilty when we do something wrong; we should.  There comes a point, though, when we need to forgive ourselves and move on.

2. It is possible to make the same mistake again and again without knowing why. People are creatures of habit.  We tend to have certain ways of behaving - certain patterns to our actions.  Some habits are good and some are not.  If we repeatedly find ourselves in similar aversive situations we are probably doing something to contribute to the problem.  Often we cannot see it ourselves; we may need to ask someone close to us for feedback in order to figure it out.  The goal is to try to identify any negative patterns of behavior you are engaging in.  Recognition is sufficient for change.  We might feel compelled to spend our time exploring why we engage in certain behaviors; we think if we know why something happens we will know how to fix it.  THIS IS NOT TRUE!  Knowing why we do something tells us nothing about how to stop doing it.  You can delve into your psyche looking for childhood wounds.  You are almost certain to find some - no one comes out of childhood with all of their emotional and psychological needs completely met.  (Remember, our parents are human too).  Once you discover these wounds, though, what will you do with them?  You'll still be left with the same problem behaviors and no closer to knowing what to do about it.  Focus on identifying the problem and initiating change first.  You can ask why later.

3. You cannot force someone to learn from your mistakes.  Most of us have had the experience of watching helplessly as someone we love makes bad decisions.  We can see they are traveling a dangerous path and we want to protect them.  The desire to safeguard those we love is natural.  Parents protect their children.  Older siblings look out for their younger siblings.  Mentors watch out for their mentees.  Those of us who have lived a bit longer have the benefit of experience.  We've made our mistakes and we've suffered the consequences.  We don't want our loved ones to suffer the same consequences.  We don't want them to make the same mistakes we made; we want better for them.  And so we teach them.  We impart to them the knowledge we've gained from our experience; we share with them the lessons we've learned.  Unfortunately, despite our best efforts we cannot always prevent someone we love from repeating our mistakes.  We can caution, cajole, alert, advise, insist, or imply.  Maybe our loved one will listen; maybe he won't.  In the end, we have to allow those we love to make their own decisions (we're talking about adults; children are, of course, different).  Sometimes people need to see things for themselves, to make their own mistakes.  Just try to avoid saying, "I told you so."

4. There is no shame in admitting you screwed up. Nobody enjoys messing up.  Neverthelesss, it is usually preferable to admit you made a mistake as opposed to trying to cover it up.  Acknowledging your mistake frees you up to change course without making excuses.  I for one have a lot more respect for someone who says, "Hey, I screwed up.  We're going to fix it and try something else" than for someone who stubbornly sticks to a course of action simply because to deviate would mean admitting they were wrong.

Just a few fundamental truths.  I'm sure there are many more.  Does anyone else have one to add?

The things that helped me most

About a year ago, my little sister was going through a difficult period in her life.  My heart ached for her, both because I hated to see her hurting and because I knew how she felt; I went through a very similar period in my own life several years ago.  I did all the normal things that sisters do in times like these - mostly just being there to talk and to listen - but I felt there should be something more I could do to help.  Ultimately, I decided the best way to help was to share with my sister what helped me in my own struggle.  To this end, I wrote her a letter.

I realize that just because something helped me doesn't mean it will help someone else.  But it might.  I'm not going to share the more personal tidbits of the letter I gave my sister, but I do want to share the strategies that helped me get through some pretty dark times.  So here goes:

A visual journal: I poured my heart and soul into visual journaling for about a year.  The art itself was at times mediocre; at times it was quite shitty.  The process of creating the art…it was amazing.  It was like I was literally pouring my emotions out.  They made so much more sense when I could see them on the outside (and not just inside of me, where they usually hang out).  I found a good article that explains the whole process.  Check it out:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-healing-arts/201006/cool-art-therapy-intervention-4-visual-journaling

Looking for patterns:  People tend to act out their unresolved psychological or emotional conflicts.  Look for patterns.  Look back over your life and identify any behavior or set of behaviors that have repeated themselves over and over again.  For me, this was repeatedly falling in love with emotionally unavailable, commitment phobic men.  There were all sorts of reasons for this, not all of which I have identified even now.  Still, it’s important to see the pattern and to think about what might be driving it. 

Identifying your emotional needs and not expecting one person to meet them all: I read this book once that completely blew my mind.  It was called “How to be an Adult in Relationships” by David Richo.  He says that we should not expect a partner to meet more than 25% of our emotional needs.  The rest we have to get met in other people (friends, family, coworkers, etc.) or activities (art, music, relaxation, etc.).  We also have to learn to meet some of them ourselves.  Briefly, the “5 A’s” are: attention, acceptance, appreciation, affection, and allowing (yourself and others to be as they are).  You should really read this book.

Pay attention to how you talk to yourself: Everybody talks to themselves, either out loud or in their heads.  When I first started working out, I remember “motivating” myself to push harder by telling myself, “Move your fat ass” or “Keep going bitch!”  I used to think to myself that maybe I was unlovable.  (I later learned that there is no such thing as unlovable, but more about that later).  Just thinking these things made me feel like shit.  Yet, I still didn’t understand why I didn’t like myself.  Here’s the deal: you have to treat yourself like you treat people you like.  You don’t go around calling your friends bitches or worthless and you shouldn’t do it to yourself.  If you want to learn to love yourself then the first thing you have to do is to be nice to yourself.  Don’t put yourself down.  (Tell yourself to shut up when you do put yourself down). 

Acceptance: Accept yourself as you are without wishing to be something or someone else.  That doesn’t mean that there aren’t things you want to work on or goals you want to achieve.  It’s always good to work to become better; just don’t do it because you think you aren’t good enough as you are.  Accepting yourself as you are is not something you can just do once and be done with it.  (I wish it were that easy).  Self acceptance is something you have to do over and over again, every time you notice that you’re unhappy with how you are. The irony of self-acceptance is this: it is not until you accept yourself as you are that you are able to change.  If you always put off being happy with who you are – I’ll be happy when I get a good job, I’ll be happy when I get my own place, etc. – then you will always end up being disappointed. Acceptance – contentment – is something that happens right now, in the moment, or not at all. 

Self-compassion: Think about how you would feel if you see someone you love suffering.  You feel for that person and offer them love, warmth, and kindness.  You don’t judge him or say to him, “See, that’s what you get,” even if his suffering is the result of his own bad decisions.  “Everyone makes mistakes,” you tell him.  “Don’t beat yourself up.  You’re only human.”  You might go out of your way to check up on your loved one or to do something nice for him because you know he’s having a hard time. This is compassion.  Most of us have no problem offering compassion to other people.  Yet when faced with our own suffering, we tend to respond in ways that are decidedly un-compassionate. Take time to acknowledge when you are hurting; don’t try to ignore it or “suck it up” in hopes that it will eventually go away.  Recognize that you are going through a difficult time and think of ways to comfort yourself.  Give yourself extra attention.  Instead of judging or criticizing yourself, give yourself permission to be human.  Making a mistake or going through a hard time is part of being human.  You don’t have to beat yourself up for it.  Some people think, “If I’m not hard on myself then I won’t learn from my mistakes.”  This is not true.  Putting yourself down doesn’t teach you a lesson, it just makes you feel like shit.  It’s not helpful.

Core beliefs: These are the things our problems are made of.  Core beliefs typically operate on a subconscious level, so most of us are not really aware of them.  There is so much going on in our external environment at any given moment that there is no way our brain could take everything in.  Our brains use our core beliefs as filters.  Information that is consistent with what we believe about ourselves, other people, and the world is deemed important and is allowed into our conscious awareness.  Information that doesn’t fit with our core beliefs is deemed unimportant and is filtered out without ever reaching our conscious awareness.  In this way, our core beliefs influence how we perceive the world around us.

People need core beliefs; we can’t function effectively without them.  Sometimes, though, people have beliefs that are extreme and distorted.  This inevitably creates problems.  The core belief that created so many problems for me was, “I am unlovable.” 

Most people suffering with depression have at least one or two unrealistic core beliefs that are contributing to their negative emotions.  It is important to identify yours so that you can work to change them.

I hope this helps!