By Henrylito D. Tacio
To err is human – that’s what essayist Alexander Pope said. Because we are human beings, we are bound to commit errors and blunders. No one is perfect in this imperfect world. Even if your intention is good, there are people who will find fault in what you do.
Of course you know Carl Sandburg, “one of the greatest American poets and biographers.” He had filled many newspaper positions, won prizes and awards for poetry, given the world a great biography of American president Abraham Lincoln, and became famous as a singer of American folk songs.
But Sandburg, like any other human being, once made a terrible mistake. In his famous biography, Abraham Lincoln: The Prairie Years, he wrote: “Lincoln’s mother was standing at the door of their cabin singing ‘Greenland’s Icy Mountain.’” Quite a feat – the song was not written until twenty-two years after Lincoln’s death!
More often than not, writers are bound to commit errors. In his immortal novel, Robinson Crusoe, author Daniel Dafoe had his shipwrecked castaway to try to salvage some goods: “I resolved, if possible, to get to the ship; so I pulled off my clothes, for the weather was not to extremity, and took to the water” (Italics supplied).
After the naked Crusoe climbed aboard the ship: “I found that all the ship’s provisions were dry: and being well disposed to eat, I went to the bread room and filled my pockets with biscuits.” Suddenly, Crusoe was wearing a shirt?
“If you live long enough, you’ll make mistakes,” former American president Bill Clinton said. “But if you learn from them, you’ll be a better person.” That was what George Washington had in mind, too, when he wrote a letter to Fielding Lewis. “To rectify past blunders is impossible,” he penned, “but we might profit by the experience of them.”
Thomas Alva Edison held a world record of 1093 patents for inventions. Perhaps, the greatest challenge was the development of a practical incandescent, electric light. Contrary to popular belief, he didn’t “invent” the lightbulb but rather he improved upon a 50-year-old idea.
In 1879, using lower current electricity, a small carbonized filament, and an improved vacuum inside the globe, he was able to produce a reliable, long-lasting source of light. The idea of electric lighting was not new, and a number of people had worked on, and even developed forms of electric lighting. But up to that time, nothing had been developed that was remotely practical for home use.
After experimenting more than 200 different substances, a colleague told him: “You have failed more than 200 times; why don’t you give up?” Edison replied, “Not at all. I have discovered more than 200 things that will not work. I will soon find one that will.”
After one and a half years of work, success was achieved when an incandescent lamp with a filament of carbonized sewing thread burned for thirteen and a half hours.
“All men make mistakes, but only wise men learn from their mistakes,” commented British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. To which Albert Einstein might have added, “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
Don’t worry about what other people will say about you and what you have done. “Take chances, make mistakes,” urges Mary Tyler Moore. “That’s how you grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.”
Here’s advice from another Hollywood actress, Cybill Shepherd: “We have to keep trying things we’re not sure we can pull off. If we just do the things we know we can do, you don’t grow as much. You gotta take those chances on making those big mistakes.”
“No matter what mistakes you may have made – no matter how you’ve messed things up – you still can make a new beginning,” said American inspirational author Normal Vincent Peale. “The person who fully realizes this suffers less from the shock and pain of failure and sooner gets off to a new beginning.”
Someone said: A doctor’s mistake is buried. A lawyer’s mistake is imprisonment. An accountant’s mistake is jailed. A dentist’s mistake is pulled. A pharmacist’s mistake is dead. A plumber’s mistake is stopped. An electrician’s mistake is shocking. A carpenter’s mistake is sawdust. A teacher’s mistake is failing. A printer’s mistake is redone.
All these mistakes can’t be undone, however. Or as John Bradshaw said, “It’s okay to make mistakes. Mistakes are our teachers – they help us to learn.”
History repeats itself. So why don’t we learn from those who committed those errors. You probably have heard the story of Acres of Diamonds told by Reverend Russell Conwell. If you haven’t, here’s the story:
Although a farmer, Hafid was probably one of the richest men in Africa. He owned a large farm with fertile soil, herds of camels and goats, orchards of dates and figs. Then, one day, a wandering holy man visited his farm and mentioned that huge fortunes were being made discovering and mining diamonds – fortunes greater than even Hafid’s.
This news captured Hafid’s attention. He inquired of the holy man what diamonds were and where they could be found. The holy man said he wasn’t sure of all the details but he had heard that diamonds were usually found in the white sands of rivers that flowed out from valleys formed by V-shaped mountains.
Hafid, eager to increase his fortune, sold his farm, herds, and orchards. He placed his family in the care of someone else and set out to find his fortune. Hafid’s travels took him all over Africa. Finally, in deep despair he threw himself off a mountain and died a frustrated, broken, poor man.
End of the story? No, for Hafid never learned his lesson well. He made the mistake of selling his land to another farmer who was not so ambitious. One time, the farmer who bought Hafid’s farm noticed a pretty rock in the river while having his camels quenched their thirst. He took it home and put it on a shelf where the sun would strike it and splash rainbows of color across the room.
The same holy man came back to the farm. He was immediately startled by the rainbow of light from the rock. “That’s a diamond!” he said. He asked where it came from and the farmer told him he got it from the river.
The two went to the river, which flowed out from a valley formed by a V-shaped mountain. And they found larger diamonds one after another. There were so many of them, large and small. The land, which Hafid sold in search of diamonds, was actually the land he was looking for.
Some people make the mistake of working abroad to become wealthy. Without knowing it, the real wealth is within their grasp – only if they know how to find them. Hard work, determination, and perseverance – these are the things we need to have to succeed in life.
Don’t forget guidance from Someone Up There, too. Without Him, we cannot do anything.
“Hindsight, or our ability to see our past clearly, is a learning function that, when damaged, renders us unable to look at the past to guide ourselves through the present and into the future,” Barbara S. Cole wrote in The Gifts of Sobriety. “Without this ability, we cannot learn from our mistakes. We cannot clean up the wreckage of our actions. We are locked into a cycle of repeating the same thing over and over again, expecting different results.” – ###
