The only way to learn is to make mistakes and not be fearful of them. Mistakes are valuable for what they give us, experience. We build on our experiences and learn. I don’t think you can learn anything without having made a number of mistakes first.

I am finding this a hard entry to write. I have made several “mistakes” already. You hopefully haven’t noticed because I have gone back, changed words, deleted entire paragraphs and written something that is at least intelligible. It reminds me that everyone has failed at writing in their lives. Think back to your childhood, who hasn’t written a “b” or a “d” backwards at least a few dozen times. As kids, we are given lots of encouragement and adults won’t let us give up. Reading and writing are too important they say. We get a million chances to make mistakes and learn in school and at home.

As time goes on, parents and teachers become a little more unforgiving when it comes to mistakes. Why does this happen? Why do we say things like “Failure is not an option,” when it really should be. It makes people afraid to try things because they think they might fail. Failure holds a lot of people back.

I think we need to embrace failures. We need to accept every failure as a learning experience. We need to fail more often, not worry about it, learn from it and move on. Let’s start a failure revolution here. I’ve been collecting tonnes of failures. Is anyone out there with me?