Mis-shapes, mistakes, misfits

“And bad mistakes, I’ve made a few. I’ve had my share of sand kicked in my face, but I’ve come through….” ~Freddie Mercury / Queen

I am not sure I can trust anyone who says they don’t make mistakes. Really. Because you know they make them, they just either pin their mistakes on other people, sweep them under the rug in fear, or they are just too vain to admit to them (Everyone knows an, “I’m perfect, I don’t make mistakes” person). The end result for them is that they never really seem to learn those important lessons do they? I am sure you’ve all dealt with someone in your life who fits this profile. You’re probably still waiting for that apology you’ll never get. Just know, you are absolutely deserving of that apology and it is not you, it’s on them.

What are mistakes if not opportunities for regrowth? A bolt of lightning can decimate a forest, but the forest grows back stronger does it not? A seed catching flight on a butterfly might just bring the most magnificent flowers to your garden, by chance. Maybe you missed it when you were pulling your weeds. Never take for granted the lessons you learn from the mistakes you make.

This pandemic has blown some very deep weeds into my garden. Metaphorically speaking, that is. I have spent a lot of time having random thoughts about mistakes I have made in my past and reflecting on the effects they had. As I have gotten older, I have began to appreciate my wild youth (thanks to being the youngest child of my family). I don’t think it was a conscious effort by my parents. My mother was always working past 8pm (in an accounting firm) and my father was working shift work on an automotive assembly line. They didn’t have time to monitor my shenanigans. So, I got to experience a lot of life (more like, get into all sorts of trouble). I was given a lot of freedom to make mistakes. I was given the space and time to learn from them too. The wisdom I have earned through a lifetime of challenges, mistakes I have made and corrected, and the chances I have taken on people and new experiences has been and education for my soul. I wasn’t meant to be oblivious in the garden of Eden.

It blows my mind that there are fully grown adults out there right now, completely afraid to make mistakes. Anxiety-ridden to the extreme because they were so protected and managed as children. So scheduled, and so strictly followed, that they may never know the beauty that comes from the freedom to make and own your own mistakes. Do yourself a favour and give yourself the freedom to make mistakes on your own, and have the courage to own them, to learn from them and never look back. After all, as Trooper used to sing, “We’re here for a good time, not a long time.”

We only seem to really understand how short this life is, and how very little time we have as we age. When we watch our children grow and start counting the days to our retirement. The days we incorrectly think we will start to live. And now while we’re in the midst of a pandemic, stuck indoors, pledging to come out of this and do all those things we didn’t commit our time to pre-pandemic, because of: (enter excuse A, B, C, D), we’re fooling ourselves again.

It begs the question, if you had a time machine and you could go back and correct your mistakes, would you? I have thought a lot about this. There are many many mistakes I have made which are regrettable, and caused me great pain. A certain person I wish I never met, a bus ride I wish I hadn’t taken… But if I am being honest, I wouldn’t be who I am today if I hadn’t made those mistakes, and if I hadn’t chosen that path. I wouldn’t have the strength I have right now if I hadn’t been abandoned to face the music. I wouldn’t have the compassion I now have without the pain I have lived through. Who knows what I would have right now, if I hadn’t walked through that fire om my own. I picked the pieces of my heart off the floor many times. I have shed many gallons of tears, and spent many lonely nights sorting through the mess I made for myself. I simply dusted myself off and kept going.

The bravery I have, from the lessons I have learned, from the mistakes I have made, all empower me to move forward with compassion and without fear. After all, in the end, I may find, that the mistakes I have made, were necessary to bring all the dancing butterflies to my very own perfect garden.