Go ahead, make mistakes.

Kathryn Schulz gave a TED talk was all about my worst fear- being wrong. She talks about how by age 9 we are taught that if we make mistakes we are not smart, we are lazy and we are not worthy. We then strive for a life of perfection. I know I see this in my own life because I constantly feel the need to have straight A’s and if I have a bad soccer practice I am really hard on myself about it. I feel this pressure that the only way to succeed is to be perfect. But what Schulz is saying is that it is human nature to be wrong. No one knows everything about the world; no one knows their purpose or meaning. People need to step back and say “I’m okay with not knowing”. This really relates to my own idea of the children mattering. Children, before schools starts picking out the losers and the winners, have an innate curiosity to learn and grow. They do not know that being wrong is bad; they simply make mistakes and grow from it. I think society needs to teach this to kids in school to keep trying and learning rather than making them feel dumb for getting stuff wrong. If kids can be taught to accept being wrong and then retain this throughout their whole lives they will gain a new, open mind towards people and life. Adults are usually very stuck in their ways and hate being wrong. They tend to think that their opinion is always right…but it’s an opinion. People need to be more accepting to this and listen to others. I think that if people act more like children do, curious about new information, the world could be a lot more peaceful. Sometimes people are wrong. We screw up, we fumble our words, we trip in the grocery store, and we act like we know a lot when we don’t. People are forever going to do this, but I think that we are okay with this aspect. What we are not okay with is getting called out for it. Think about someone fearless you know, someone who can always laugh at themselves when they are wrong and who doesn’t seem to care when they are. These are the kinds of people we need. And to me, children have this. They have this gift of fearless curiosity that just enables them to be able to do anything their minds can imagine. This goes to relate to Pink. He says the future is going to be more creative and innovative –this is going to require mistakes. Some of the best ideas come from mistakes and experimenting, but without the ability to accept being wrong- these mistakes won’t happen. Being wrong is scary, and not knowing how things are going to turn out is even scarier. But if people can embrace that being wrong is alright, then they can succeed. People need to learn that perfection should not be there goal. This sounds really difficult to achieve, but I think that is only because these ideas are stomped out of us when we are kids. School teaches us that we must be smart and get good grades and not make mistakes. However, schools should be teaching kids that messing up is acceptable and help kids use their mistakes to grow. What matters to the success of the future is messing up; it will help create this creative and inspired society the Pink describes. And it starts with the children and encouraging them to explore and be wrong and learn.

Kathryn Schulz talk here