A mistake thought

[marsden_online]

After reading http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2011/05/11/the-fear-of-making-mistakes-and-interesting-insights-on-being-wrong/

I'm not afraid of making mistakes in code. Mistakes in code can be found and fixed.

I'm not afraid of making mistakes in blog posts (although I strive not to). Corrections can be be published.

Mistakes made in social interactions are much harder to remedy and are more likely to have long-term consequences. I am afraid of making a mistake that does harm*; of making a mistake I can't fix.

*Not entirely unselfish - IME hurt always reflects back to me

Is this because my lack of childhood socialisation left me without the coping mechanisms to deal with upsetting those around me or a reflection of perfectionism?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

It's a tricky one to answer, If when you are young and you mix a lot with diverse people, you quickly learn skills about how to react to differing situations with people who react differently to what you expect them to do.

The learning is low stress too as kids tend to forgive easier and can go from friends to not speaking to back to full on friends again, without any problems.

As we grow up, our attitudes to things change and we get more ordered and so get more affected by people reacting differently to what we expected.


If we haven't learn't at a early age that some things just don't matter as much as getting along, then it becomes harder to deal with others who don't seem to fit our perception of how they should act and our expectations of how they relate to us.

Simply put, kids fight and get over it in a day or so over something trivial, adults tend to take longer to reset back to nice.

I gave this subject a lot of thought over the years, and at first could not understand why people don't treat everyone else nicely and as they would like themselves to be treated.

I came up with the idea after talking to others, that the more confident we are in ourselves and happy with the things we do ourselves, the more open and accepting of other's differences we will be and consequently if we aren't trying get others to met our high bars of standards of perfect friends and workmates, which is sometimes unachievable, we will be happier for it.


That is what I try and do now, I see the good in people, and try and ignore the annoying bits, I might hope that people change to meet my wishes of them being perfect but I know that it is not achievable and focus on enjoying the times that my friends and workmates come through and make me laugh with a joke or make me feel great with the things they achieve.


I think at the end of the day, if you can think I did someone some good today, I worked reasonably well and have a roof over my head, I would count that day a success.


Perfectionism is a good thing to aim for, but hard to achieve, and achievement gives good feelings, so aiming for an achievable thing, even if not quite perfect will give a happier feeling than aiming for the unachievable.

That said, many people have achieved what others said could not be achieved so aim for what you think is good.

Re friends and workmates, accept they aren't perfect, not ever likely to be, but like them anyway. If they do things you don't like, walk away, stay true to yourself.

Know that you are liked by me, and many others. mike