A New Perspective on Mistakes

Everyone makes mistakes. This is a given. Hopefully we learn from some of them. A thought that came to mind today, and which has surfaced a few times in the past, is that sometimes we’re not the only ones learning from our mistakes.

My kids do not sit back on the hind legs of their chairs. Really, you ask? No, because I told them about the time I did that in the kitchen and fell over backwards, hitting my head on the refrigerator. I also told them about a girl at a school where I once taught who had a fortunately hilarious experience falling backward out of a chair. They are also cautious around the stove and do not play with matches. I have stories about that too.

My girls are still virgins. They are waiting until they are older; not because of any religious reason, but because I taught them to have respect for themselves and be selective of their partners. Choose people who respect you too. Be careful. Be responsible. Wait until you’ve lived your life a little before you have children. Finish your education and make a life for yourself first.

I finished high school, but I got married and had children before I finished college. I was too young. Now I am divorced, have more student debt than I would have had if I had stayed in school and I probably struggle more than I would have if I had waited.

As a result, my oldest doesn’t want to get married at all. She wants to be a doctor and boys and kids will get in the way, she says. My other teenage daughter is going to at least wait until she finishes high school and figures out what she wants to do with her life. My son thinks he’s going to stay at home forever I think. He has a bad case of Peter Pan Syndrome. Thankfully, he has some time.

Experience is a good teacher. I have no desire to ever remarry and my kids are at best cautious about moving too fast in that direction. As I tell them often, there is plenty of time for those things. Be you first.

My mistakes creep up often and sometimes bite me. Up until this point, this blog had been written earlier in the day and, in my opinion, had a positive tone. My evening was not so positive. Rather, it was filled with sadness, regret and a general dedication to kicking myself for my mistakes and a strong desire to escape from it all. We can’t do anything about our mistakes, other than accept them, try to learn from them, hope maybe our kids will learn from them and move on. I guess the Serenity Prayer is most apt in these situations, whether we actually pray or not: Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.