To Fail is to Improve

I believe to confront a problem is one way to learn and improve. No one who has ever had to deal with a problem has ever improved. Simply said if you’ve never done anything wrong then you’ve never had a reason or a way to improve. All humans do is find problems and then react and find ways to either solve them or avoid them in the future. Without encountering problems we don’t grow.

I’m an artist and I can honestly say I’ve encountered many problems in my craft. These problems have only made me better as an artist. One example of a problem I’ve made in my art is not waiting long enough for the paint to try before adding another layer of paint on top. This creates a clumping rippling effect that isn’t very appealing to the eye. From this mistake, I learned to wait till the paint fully dries to add another layer. If I didn’t make mistakes in my art I probably wouldn’t take criticism as well. If someone else saw a problem with my artwork and I never made a mistake like that, it may have a more negative impact than if I was used to making mistakes and fixing them. Making a mistake isn’t about doing something wrong. Making mistakes is about recognizing what you have done wrong or can improve and learn how to prevent making the same mistake again. Even if you make the same mistake many times your still going to learn some kind of valuable lesson from it.

Mistakes are so valuable to me. Whenever I mess up anything I don’t discourage that I did something wrong no matter how simple the mistake is. One time when I was painting the black on the border of my Sunset painting and I got it on the front of the painting and there was no reversing it. I was sad about the mistake but I learned from it to be much more careful while handling black paint. When I mess up I just say oops and move on with my life. All I will do is make a mental note with my lesson and I’m not phased afterward. If someone lives their life being afraid to mess up and fail, I think they are more prone to mess up and fail to be honest. when someone expects something to happen it’s more bound to occur. Like if you think you’re going to freeze during a speech, that’s exactly what you’re going to do. If you are ok with messing up life will go much smoother. You’ll start the speech and freeze but you won’t panic you’ll just acknowledge the mistake and move on. The power of mistakes is extraordinary, especially when you learn from them.

Overall I very much agree that problems help you do your best because they truly can. Whether it be hitting a wrong note singing, getting a homework assignment wrong, or just forgetting a paper for school or work. We all make mistakes. Each with a valuable lesson.

“always make new mistakes” by elycefeliz is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.