Mistakes

I used to believe that one of the purposes in life was to get to a place where I made no mistakes.  In my reading this morning is a prayer, "Help me, Higher Power.   Help me remember that the purpose of making mistakes is to prepare myself to make more; help me remember that when I'm no longer making mistakes I'll be out of this world."  I am so lucky to have found recovery where I do what I can to avoid mistakes since I don't like their consequences but at the same time knowing that I am going to make some.  This reminds me that one of the definitions of a sociopath is that he/she doesn't learn from his/her mistakes.  I can always learn from my mistakes which in turn makes it possible for me to continue to grow and get better at life as I go along.  It was impossible for me to do that when I looked for somebody else to blame.

I remember this especially when I'm in the midst of one of my self-improvement projects.  Right now I'm working on getting up early and taking no naps.  The purpose is to get more productive time every day.  On the one hand, I am doing a whole lot better.  On the other hand, I'm very far away from my goal.  The old part of me is trying to surface and tell me I'm a failure for all the days I pooped out and took a nap and then didn't go to sleep until 11:00 p.m. which in turn made it impossible to get up early.  However, I'm simply not listening - I've been up every single day before 9:00 a.m. and have had way more productive hours every day.  I'm not giving up on the goal and I'm happy about progress,  Plus as long as I don't give up, I can't possibly fail.  All the mistakes I've made have just allowed me to learn how I need to do things so that I can reach my goal.