We are human. We always want to present our best foot forward. No one wants to admit any type of failure. This is why the teacher giving out weekly tests in high school is such an incentive to study and learn the materials of the past few classes. No high school student ever wants to fail.
In our own personal lives, we value all our successes and hard work. We look at our house, our vehicle, our education accomplishments and our work skills, and we feel good. Our identity is not the sum total of all our successes and accomplishments.
We also have made a lot of mistakes along the way. We did not get our work done for the deadline because we were out playing soccer with our friends. We went along with some of the hair-brained projects of some of our friends and ended up getting the truck stuck in an irrigation ditch along a farmer’s field. We made some risky investments and lost eight thousand dollars.
Everyone has made their fair share of mistakes and poor choices. Hopefully we never repeated these mistakes. We learnt from them and made better choices. But these mistakes are part of our history. They make part of our identity. For many people, they are much better human beings because they made many foolish mistakes. They learnt from them. They grew and matured.
We need to reflect on all the mistakes we have made and cherish these mistakes for the growth they propelled in us. Just as parents become better parents through their mistakes, so we too become better people in working through the consequences of our mistakes.
Do not limit making mistakes to the individual. Societies, governments, medical institutions and the Church also make mistakes. Our history is not Lilly white. There are many very dark parts of our history. How have we learnt from our mistakes?
One of the blatant examples is the practice of slavery. Already two hundred years ago it was committed Christians who worked hard to abolish the slave trade. No human being can ever be owned as a piece of merchandise and exploited for their labor. Every single human being, we have learnt the hard way, has the right to be free and can never be owned as a commodity.
How many times have you heard an individual who struggled with the addictions conclude: What was the worst thing that ever happened in my life? It would be those many years of heavy drinking. And what is the best thing that ever happened in your life: It was those many years of heavy drinking! ‘It was only through the pain and suffering of alcohol addiction that I came to sobriety and am sincerely living a good life filled with a lot of friendships.’
The strongest indications that we have not benefitted from our mistakes as human beings is the wars we keep fighting. How has humanity ever benefitted from the killing fields of war? All those mistakes of war are part of our identity.
If we can be honest enough to name and take ownership of our mistakes, we can enter into a more honest time of our history. Our story is shaped by great feats of creativity and moving forward but is also shaped by many soul-hurting mistakes.
Mistakes are part of who we are. For the most part, these mistakes have spurred us on to a better and life-giving existence.
Naming and taking ownership of our mistakes will makes us better human beings and a healthy society.
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