This morning I was reminded by my mentor, Darren Hardy, that my reaction to my mistakes is so important. I briefly reflected on ways that I, and the people around me, react when a mistake is discovered.
- Puffer Fish 🐡mode: Defence with spikes and try to protect my ego;
- Angry Tiger 🐯mode: roar and get angry at the person who discovered my mistake;
- Sad Puppy 🐶mode: Become a victim and try to get sympathy;
- Nervous Hare 🐇mode: run away as fast as I can mode;
- Dumb Bear 🐻mode: pretend like it doesn’t matter (and since I’m the biggest, it really doesn’t matter as long as I say it doesn’t matter).
I have my favourites, but I’m pretty sure I’ve gone into every mode when I’m feeling reactive. Things are happening to me and I’m out of control. The perfection I was trying for, I just can’t deal with it.
So how can we (you and me) be better at dealing with mistakes?
This is where Darren helped me today (and if you’re reading this on October 23 you have less than 2 days to watch his video on the topic). Very practical advice to help you quickly get mistakes to help you and not hurt you (or the people around you).
- Own it – just admit it. We all know it anyway, and if we don’t we will soon enough.
- Explain it – what happened? We need to understand if it’s human error or something bigger.
- Explain what you will do in the future to ensure that it doesn’t happen again. (This is key, learning from our mistakes).
- Say sorry – we like you and just want to know if you care. We can deal with mistakes. We want to forgive and move forward, better. That’s it.
If this is helpful, drop me a line or forward this to a friend. If communicating your mistakes is a challenge for you, maybe I can help you with my resources in “Everyone Communicates Few Connect.”
