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When You Make a Mistake, What Happens Next?

Writer's picture:  Hilary Jacobs Hendel Hilary Jacobs Hendel

There’s an old children’s book where a little piggy says, “When I make a mistake, I pick myself up.”

Like the piggy, this is how we want to view mistakes: Mistakes are part of life and they can always be remedied. We can always pick ourselves up.


I was lucky. When I was little and I broke something, my mom would say, “It’s ok. Everything is replaceable except people.” Now as an adult, when I make a mistake, I stay calm enough to think through solutions. I don’t have a punishing voice in my head.


Too many of my patients learned another message about making mistakes. They learned, “When I make a mistake, I should beat myself up.”


It’s a common misconception that berating others or our ourselves for making mistakes teaches important lessons and helps us “be better." In truth, all it does is create a fear of making mistakes. And sadly, a fear of making mistakes makes it extremely anxiety-provoking to try new things, interrupting our natural born strivings for exploration and learning.


There’s an expression in AEDP therapy, the method of therapy I fell in love with over two decades ago, that goes, It’s not what happens. It’s what happens next that matters. Our reactions to adversity determine if our mistakes become opportunities for repair, change, and learning or if they kick off a repeat pattern of maladaptive defenses and painful inhibitory emotions like anxiety, guilt, and shame.


When you make a mistake, do you pick yourself or beat yourself up?


Want to experiment? Try this exercise in awareness:


  1. Think of the last time you made a mistake.

  2. Check off all the emotions that you feel with respect to this memory:


  • Shame

  • Guilt

  • Sadness

  • Fear

  • Anxiety

  • Self-compassion

  • Calm


  1. How do you want to feel when you make a mistake?

  2. What beliefs have to change for you to forgive yourself for your mistakes?

  3. Can you work the Change Triangle to get to a calmer more compassionate stance towards yourself?


Mistakes are a part of life. Can you forgive yourself for yours? I hope that you will.


A+ for trying!

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