Making Mistakes

"Mistakes are not just golden
opportunities for learning; they are, in an important sense, the only opportunity
for learning something truly new."

Success teaches you nothing. All it does is give us a warm little tingle that we know we want more of.

If you're not making mistakes, you're probably not learning.

It's okay to make mistakes. No, really. If you're building in SL, there's a ton of opportunities to make them, and learn something. You've lost nothing but a little time. Back up and have another go.

Sure there are plenty of times in Real Life and in Second Life where it's not okay to make mistakes. Piloting an RL Airbus A380 comes immediately to mind. The important thing in that case is that pilots have trained, prepared, and made a ton of mistakes already, so they don't have to later on.

We all make mistakes with people. All the time. We fail to talk, when we should talk. We don't say the right thing. We say the right thing in the wrong way. It happens. It will keep happening.

Remember, one of the most important things in dealing with people is what you do after. Well, it is for me. I've made plenty of mistakes with people in my time, and will probably make many more. I'll keep trying, though, and keep learning, and trying harder.

And with just a little luck and wisdom, the other person will meet you partway and help you fix things up again. Keep seeing the good in people, because there's plenty there if you look - the hardest place to see basic human goodness is in ourselves.

Many of you have been very kind, and very patient with me. With the peculiar ways that I speak. With the peculiar ways that I think and feel. I don't always feel that I give enough back to you all, for all your kindness, even when you don't understand.

Just keep being yourselves. Keep learning. Keep trying. Doing good is a worthy thing in it's own right, even if we make mistakes and mess up. Trying, sometimes, is more important than succeeding.

If we all try our best, nobody can ask any more of us.