Learn from the Mistake

Do you remember what you learned from your last big mistake?

I learned to communicate more openly and without filters. My last mistake was a big smack in the face and recalibrate everything I do. Nobody wants a mistake like that, but I'm grateful to have learned and to still be learning. The side effects aren't even over yet, and so I'm sure that the learning has just begun.

Centered leaders learn from their mistakes and change the habits that lead to those mistakes.

Habits are hard to change. They are more easily replaced by effective, useful habits, rather than simply dropped. We want to do something. The trick is to choose what works.

My friend David Spiegel is an expert at changing habits. Just knowing that he reads these posts has given me a new habit of making sure everything I write here has some value. At least I think it does. Not just value, but useful value. Something that I hope someone can put to immediate use.

One of the things that Dave does is to help people lose weight. In today's world that's an important mission. Health is so critical.

I help people lead more effectively, mainly through better communication. After my last big mistake (a failed relationship) it occurs to me that maybe my real, most true mission should be helping people communicate more effectively. Especially leaders, but really - everyone benefits from communicating more effectively.

So that's what I'm gleaning from my recent big mistake. High performance leaders use their mistakes as levers to a higher plain.

What did you learn from your most recent biggest mistake?

-- Doug Smith

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Change Quickly

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Make the Hard Choices

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