Mistakes

'Regrets and mistakes are memories made' - Adele

I felt it fitting to start off with words of wisdom from Adele herself. I've had the concept of mistakes and life lessons on the brain and really did before attending University. My whole life I have been very responsible. My prerogative was if I don't go past the 'don't go there' line nothing bad will happen but that made me very sheltered. I am fortunate enough to have very open parents that I can be completely myself with so they themselves have never sheltered me, I sheltered myself a little bit. Now I'm not saying when I went to University I became a ball of untapped chaos ready to reek havoc and do lots of stupid things, I'm saying I tried to see my little 'muppet moments' as memories and experiences rather than 'Oh holy hell what have I done?!'. This doesn't cover EVERYTHING I'm only talking about "life experience" moments or "cringe" moments as apposed to accidentally killing your friends pet or anything illegal.

When you make a little mistake, either out of character or you simply just made a mistake and you're regretting it and wanting to hide away from the world, try and think about these following questions:

* Disclaimer - This is simply advice and by no means what you should do if it will not help you, this just personally helped me *

1) Was anyone harmed in the making of this mistake? - If the answer is 'no' then whoopee it's okay, it's not the end of the world you just currently feel a little embarrassed. If the answer is 'yes' then take some time to figure out if there is a way to fix it or at least try. At the end of the day if you've made a mistake and try to amend it, it still makes you a good person for trying.

2) Was it what you wanted at the time? - Now this is a big one most people forget. It's a famous saying actually which I shall paraphrase 'You can't regret what you did at the time because in that moment it was exactly what you wanted to do'. Sure, you may be regretting telling that guy/girl from the coffee shop you think their eyes are the most beautiful things in the world (I haven't done this by the way I'm making an example) but at the time you wanted to do it and that's okay!

3) Will you be able to laugh about it later in life? - We've all done cringe worthy moments, some that haunt us forever and some that we use as anecdotes at a parties in the future. If you can laugh about it eventually then it's fine. If you've recently come out of the toilet with your knickers in your skirt then, yes, right now hide away from all the jokes BUT that will make a cracking story in the future (no pun intended). Also, now you remember to check you're all in order before leaving a bathroom. Life lesson AND funny story.

As a society it's pounded in to us at a young age to be 'perfect'. If you're very lucky, you will surround yourself with people (family or friends) who show you that you don't have to get everything right to be perfect. I consider the best kind of humans flawed. They make mistakes but they learn from them, that's how we learn after all. A very small example was in my French speaking test in school. I was doing really well I was remembering everything I had to and at the end my teacher turned to me and said 'That was very good...but you did it in a Spanish accent'. It was embarrassing obviously (P.S. I still can't do a French accent) but it meant I went on to do Spanish for my final exams and passed with a 'B'. I know that's a very tiny tiny example but we make mistakes and learn. If we were perfect, we'd be pretty boring. I know that a large part of my personality IS MAKING MISTAKES. My first kiss for example was cringey and I'm still learning to become smoother when it comes to the romance department...okay I said learning I clearly need to make some more mistakes first. Even with hobbies. I've been trained vocally and still enjoy singing but every now and then I'll try a new song and hit many a flat note. It's working and finding the right keys that work best for you. I'm not an expert or anything like that I'm just telling you my advice and what I'm learning, you don't have to take my word as gospel. But I do hope it helps so in future maybe try and question yourself before feeling guilty or worrying about you've done.