Making Mistakes

The other night, I had Nova come in to help me make dinner. I gave her the job of cutting the cherry tomatoes in half. She was excited about getting to use a big, sharp knife. After a few minutes, she calmly said, “Uh oh, mom. This one kinda messed up. It won’t cut.” She had pressed a little too hard with the knife, which smashed the tomato. I explained how to cut in a different way so that wouldn’t happen, and she was happy to keep going with my instruction.

It wasn’t until later that my mind was kind of blown by all of that. I thought about the way she responded in that moment. She made (what some would consider) a “mistake,” asked for help, received the feedback, and then kept going.

Later that night, I told Colt that story and marveled at how Nova responds really well in those kinds of scenarios.

Colt said, “Yeah, that’s because her identity wasn’t wrapped up in that task.”

So that’s what that looks like. To make a mistake and know that it’s not a big deal. To ask someone for help and then gladly receive the feedback they offer. To not connect who I am with what I do.

Sometimes it’s hard for me to remember that the way I perform a task isn’t related to my identity. God started teaching me this in the summer of 2017, but it’s something I think I’ll always be learning. I watched the grace Nova had for herself in that moment and thought, “I want to give myself that kind of grace.”

Because it’s there. Grace is available for me. I just have to accept it.

Isn’t it amazing how we teach our kids and in the same moment and breath, they are teaching us?

I had a conversation with a friend later that day and I was talking about making mistakes. I think one level of growth for me and others like me is to simply acknowledge that we do make mistakes. Another level is to be okay with making mistakes. And an even deeper level is to be okay making mistakes in front of other people.

This particular friend knows all of these things about me. She often says, “I love when you make mistakes or do something wrong!” When I not only make mistakes but make them in front of other people, I allow people in. I welcome them into my own humanity. (Which, by the way, I’m so very aware of. Most people who want to be good and do things right ironically have an extreme — and sometimes unreasonable and irrational — awareness of everything they do terribly.)

During our homeschooling months in the quarantine, one of the things we started doing with Duke was celebrating when he made a mistake. He expressed one night that he was nervous to work on school the next day because he didn’t want to do something wrong. So we remedied that by literally jumping up and down, screaming, and clapping when he got a wrong answer.

And guess what happened? He started smiling when he messed up. It was really good for him. It’d probably be really good for me, too.

For you, making mistakes or doing something wrong might not be the thing. Maybe for you it’s being vulnerable or expressing your feelings or crying in front of people. Maybe for you it’s admitting you don’t have all the knowledge in a particular area. Maybe for you it’s asking for help from other people. Whatever that thing is that you like to avoid at all costs, there is something in it for you. When you participate in that thing, you unlock new things. You let people in, you uncover new gifts in yourself, and you become more whole.