What Makes Mistakes Count.
FLUFFY WATER!
I have been studying what makes mistakes count for a very long time. Recently I watched an interview with John Dyson the creator of Dyson vacuum cleaners, he was advocating the encouragement of children to make mistakes and giving them more points for the more mistakes they make. The principle is we learn from our mistakes. That is the first flaw in this hair brained proposal, history shows we rarely learn from our mistakes until it is mostly too late. This is why we all have regrets.
Someone left a message on my weblog a little while ago to say the typos in my blog articles annoyed him or her intensely and please to correct all typing errors before publishing.
You might think I would be upset at such criticism after my efforts to publish what many agree are useful articles. Well, quite the contrary. First I was delighted to know my articles are avidly read also this comment reminded me of the terrible damage stress and long term excessive cortisol does to the brain, how it works also the end results or level of professionalism one achieves. In this case that means how few mistakes I make.
So what makes mistakes count?
My doctor told me that my level of burnout also massive and prolonged production of cortisol brought me close to instant death syndrome. That is to say my life drive system almost shut down because of the long term damage cortisol had done to my body and my brain. If you are not aware of these dangers, look up Cortisol on the internet. One of the after effects of burnout for me has been chronic word blindness. Just before my life, career and businesses came to a grinding standstill, I was at a peak of stress. Sometimes what I wrote simply did not make sense to other people. To the observer, it became clear there were missing words or parts of sentences. The strange thing was that when I read my own letters they made excellent sense. What was happening was that my unconscious mind filled in the gaps because it knew what I had in mind and what should have been written on the page.
I suspect largely due to political correctness ‘word blindness’ has been renamed Dyslexia. 40 years after leaving my boarding school in Oxfordshire, I read in an old boy’s journal 2009 an article by one of my English teachers. He said that on reflection in his opinion the majority of the boys at that school were suffering from significant dyslexia. The problem was that in the early 1960’s schools had neither a clue about dyslexia nor how to treat it.
Yes, he may have been right and on reflection I believe I did suffer from word blindness at that time and throughout my life. Research has shown that everyone is dyslexic to some extent also specific certain subjects. The trick is first recognising this fact and then learning ways to compensate rather than ignoring it or thinking you can beat it.
Most recognised geniuses are known to have been extremely dyslexic in one form or another. There are indications that severe depression may also be a form of dyxlexia. Certainly many gifted writers, artists, researchers and inventors are known to have suffered peaks of depression. Their genius seems to be actually directly as a result of the unique way they see, feel or interpreting the world, their word around them.
Now lets get back to what makes mistakes count. I get many comments from people who do not speak English as their mother tongue. Frankly their messages are terrible English because of their inadequate use of English grammar. But it does not matter because my mind can fill in the gaps and correct the defective grammar. But the question remains, why do I still make typing mistakes? The answer is that I just do not see them. This is what dyslexia does. I am currently working on a new mind program that can correct this problem. I will let you know what progress I make in due course. However, when I write an article I use spell checker to correct any spelling or typing mistakes. The problem that spell check cannot correct is if I spell the words correctly but I do not see that the word is not the right one. For example, recently I meant to write ‘wild boar’, but spelt ‘wild bore’. I was of course referring to the wild pig i.e. ‘boar’. But spellchecker is not programmed to detect inappropriate word usage.
So yes, I accept my word blindness. When I write a book manuscript I have to read the manuscript many times and still an editor will find irregularities or typos I have not been able to detect.
I understand where Dyson is coming from. Also I have the experience of managing 7 companies, to know his proposal is extremely dangerous. No business or individual career can afford too many mistakes. In my opinion it has the potential to make a mess of children’s lives in the long term future. When young we soak up information like a sponge also we set behavioral parameters that affect or dominate our attitudes and standards for the rest of our lives. To teach children by rewarding them for their mistakes is a nightmare in the making. Okay, In Dyson’s factory and R&D department with its £40 million plus R&D budget that is fine. But to send children out into the world with the idea that making mistakes is what makes mistakes count is working against their best interests in a way more chaotic than I can imagine.
So if you know you are suffering from stress, here is a clue to how bad it may be. First, ascertain in what way you are dyslexic. Has it worsened, if so to what degree? Does it fluctuate from normal to bad to chronic or how does is affect you? If you have noticed something like or similar to the above then if the condition has become serious, if only at times, you really do have to take some positive action before you risk a far more serious possibility.
You will make mistakes, we all make mistakes. What makes mistakes count is when we learn from them. Make a point not to make those mistakes again also use that learning to avoid making similar or associates mistakes. If you know anything about universal collective consciousness then you just might appreciate that you can learn from my mistake of pushing myself too far so that you can make a point of not doing that also. So why not use what makes mistakes count work for you?
So if you find some typos in the above article please feel free to tell me about them. I shall be pleased to hear from you especially if you can tell your own story of dyslexia.
- These are my books:
- Activating Spontaneous Healing To buy now go to: www.asrkey.com
- Mind Manual 1 or Genius makes 17 Available soon
For further information contact me at robertdenton@rdcoaching-power.com
