Own it and turn it into brilliance

Have you ever seen the TV series Ballers? It’s about a “fixer”/ “man Friday” to pro-football players and a series we are hooked on watching right now. Anyway, in one of the episodes the lead character Spencer, tries to patch things up with an old rival player, Balsamo, by having him throw out the first pitch at a baseball game. It’s a huge moment for the retired footballer, Balsamo. As he comes out, the crowd cheers him on and chants his name. It’s a flashback to his glory days. He takes to the pitcher’s mound and swings it hard towards home plate. He completely misses and slams the ball straight into the stomach of the boom-mic guy on the side. The crowd starts booing and someone yells “Balsamo, you suck”. Balsamo utterly butchered his spotlight moment and he stands frozen looking around at the crowd. Instead of cowering back to the stands, he owns the blunder, throws his arms up triumphantly and confidently, egging the crowd to cheer him on. Suddenly, the fans change, and they are back to applauding him and cheering him on. It’s an amazing moment. I remember watching it thinking it’s a wonderful lesson in turning things around. Not everything will go as well as we planned so why not own it and make it a brilliant lesson.

Sure, some lessons will be humbling, very humbling and we should not or may not have the opportunity to celebrate it, like catastrophes (I won’t go into detailed examples, but you can imagine what they are). These may not be the moments we throw our arms up in the air and ask for more applause, but there are lessons we can learn. We just take them in quietly, reflecting on them with care and grace.

For the most part though mistakes are just that, mistakes. We seem to give them too much negative energy, rather than spinning them into something good and something valuable to learn from. Here’s my two cents….

·        Own it – You made the mistake, take ownership. Accept, apologize and move on.

·        Fix it – It’s yours to fix, so fix it. Figure out a way to make amends, make it better and turn it around so there’s some good that comes out of it.

·        Learn from it – Mistakes have a way of repeating themselves if you don’t learn from them the first time. Funnily enough, that’s how life works. So, learn from it, preferable the first time and not the second- or third-time round.  

·        Pay it forward – If someone’s made the same mistake, help them and support them through it. 

·        Reflect – How do you do better? How can you avoid this again? What went wrong? Reflection is key for self-growth. Careful that you don’t go down the “woah is me” path. Stay above the fray. Stay classy.

·        Turn it into brilliance – Mistakes are sometimes opportunities in the making. Penicillin and the chocolate chip cookie were discovered because Sir Alexander Fleming and Ruth Wakefield made mistakes. You may not be inventing the next Penicillin but who knows, there maybe a golden opportunity you maybe missing. Look closely. 

I just finished reading the book, #Girlboss, the rags to riches story of Sophia Amoruso who founded “Nasty Gal”, the fastest growing retailer in 2012 according to Inc Magazine. There’s a line in the book that I love…. I quote; “My advice to #GIRLBOSSes is to get excited about the mistakes you’ll make”. So, here’s to the fictional Balsamo’s and the non-fictional Sophia Amoruso’s who embraced their mistakes and turned them into brilliance. It’s time we do the same!  

No regrets!

Regret is the past, crippling us in the present - unknown

.... And when you do look back you are turning your back to the future!

Have no regrets. Easier said than done. Every now and then it's easy to let your mind wonder to question the "what if's". What if I started earlier? what if I took the other course? what if I just waited instead of surging ahead? what if I said no? what if I said yes? I could go on for days and we all have them. The trick is to not go there. The "what if" really doesn't matter. It's irrelevant to now and to where you are. Ever seen the movie Click? Do go check it out if you haven't already. Well we don't all have a clicker to rewind or fast forward through life. According to the movie that wasn't the best thing to have anyway! What we do have is a gift called the present. To make full use of it we need to treasure today and let go of yesterday. Rather than reminiscing yesterday and the endless list of possibilities that were never meant to be, change tomorrow by doing something different today. If it's not the outcome you expected, then it was not meant to be.... move on.

Here's my dish:

• Looking back, there will always be things that you could have done better. You cannot go back and change what you did so why bother wasting your time thinking about the possible outcomes. Learn from your so called mistakes and move on to new ones. However, IMO (if you don't know, ask a teenager ;) there are no mistakes, only learning opportunities. I hope you have a ton of learning opportunities. They will enrich you.
• Make full use of the present. Instead of looking at the past missed opportunities, look at the present and make wise choices of what tomorrow will look like. You cannot control the outcome, but you can try. I urge you to try, try and try again.
• We don't regret the things we do. We usually regret the things we don't. So if you have some burning desire to do something, just do it! (thanks Nike! I couldn't have put it better)
• Do remember the memorable moments of the past but only briefly. Once you smile remembering those precious moments, it's time to move on and seize TODAY!