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Mistakes,
Errors & Experience It is a curious thing that we tend to grow up believing that mistakes are the bane, and not the boon, of our existence. Perhaps it stems from inept parenting. Mom and dad, more often than not, tend to criticize their children when they goof. I suppose that is not entirely bad, since the produce of error is not the sweetest fruit. Yet even children are able to discern that truth on their own, without parental help, and--most important--it is only through the making of mistakes, not only when we are children but throughout our lives, that we learn. That, in fact, is the meaning of the word "experience": the act of living through an event, of being a part of it, and, let us hope, learning something of lasting value in the process. Thus experience and wisdom are inextricably linked. The Scottish diarist, James Boswell, in his 1791 "Life of Samuel Johnston," wrote that men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience. Samuel Johnson had such a capacity, and because of that capacity--that willingness--to experience life, Johnson became one of the most distinguished men of letters in English history. We refer here not to fun, pleasant, happy experiences, but to sad, difficult, teeth-gritting ones--the ones that come with loss and lack. Samuel Johnson knew of such, but he was not unique. Today, we seem bent on trying to avoid that side of life at all costs, apparently unaware that the sadder, the more difficult, the harder we have to grit our teeth, in the wake of such experiences, the more we learn. Perhaps that is why learning is so much rarer now than in earlier times. As early as the 2nd century A.D., Rabbi Ben Hei wrote, in The Ethics of the Fathers 5:21, that "According to the pain is the gain."Benjamin Franklin used this pithy statement to write "'Industry need not wish,' as Poor Richard says, 'and he that lives upon hope will die fasting. There are no gains, without pains.'" Accept that wisdom of old, if you can. It is one of the true facts of life, a veritable rite of passage from childhood to maturity. Once you know this and let it affect you in constructive ways, your life is changed for the better, forever. How strange, then, that many of the greatest philosophers of history seem to have misunderstood it. None other than the same Benjamin Franklin, who was quoted above, also said that "Experience is a dear teacher, but fools will learn at no other". Ben, I like to think, had in mind the repetitious mistakes of like kind that fools tend to make without realizing it, but it is much too easy to interpret Ben's words as meaning that experience is not the best kind of teacher, and that--as Ben himself obviously knew--is wrong. Thomas Alva Edison, the great inventor, tried over 1,500 different materials in his incandescent light bulb before "finding" one that worked. Do not presume that Edison's trials were merely the thoughtful, plodding analyses characteristic of great scientists. They were that, but they were also a series of mistaken eureka moments that did not work out, punctuated by some that worked but were not initially recognized as such. He failed over 1,499 times before succeeding, yet his eventual "success" was actually an earlier "failing" revisited, late in the process. Truly, his technicians wondered what kind of fool they worked for. He knew, despite his notable lack of native humility, and that is why--in an unusual display of self-deprecation--he once remarked that "Genius is five percent inspiration, and ninety-five percent perspiration." Though he was right in this, it--too--is not the whole story. Merely inventing a suitable filament would not have gotten Edison to a practical light bulb. It was necessary to package that filament in a hermetically-sealed chamber, surrounded by a transparent envelope, within which all but a fraction of air had been evacuated. Only when all those elements were combined did he achieve the worthwhile success he sought. In general, it is our consciousness of the absence of something we direly need that drives us to action. If we are unconscious of such needs, or if we think such needs superfluous, we go about as Kipling's Tomlinson--whose soul had lost its palpability--as one who had never really lived. Tomlinson, the poem, sets forth the crucial part that making mistakes in life plays in our ultimate redemption. No, I speak not of the redemption sought by religious zealots, but of that pursued by the common human animal who wishes no more than to understand and participate in life here and now, and to do it morally, ethically and propitiously. Albert Einstein was--methinks--one such human animal; he once told his students that "The only source of knowledge is experience." Here was a man who knew of excruciating loss, in many venues. From the vacuum Professor Einstein perceived in one of these--the state of scientific knowledge of his day, regarding the most elementary of atomic particles and the ways they interacted--he drew his greatest inspiration to seek out the mysteries of the universe. So, experience is, indeed, our best teacher, and--yes--experience rarely teaches its most sacred truths unless the experience is painful. Jim Horning connected everything together by saying that "Good judgment comes from experience; Experience comes from bad judgment." Benjamin Disraeli exclaimed "There is no education like adversity." Aristotle stated that "We cannot learn without pain." When we hurt from it, we learn from it. John Keats commented that "Nothing ever becomes real till it is experienced- even a proverb is no proverb to you till your life has illustrated it." Surely the poet was not speaking of successes, but of failures, for only out of the pathos of disastrous error does life paint color and depth into the great proverbs of our lives. But, then, each experience teaches so many things... How can we know which is gold and whither is clay? Here the fools are separated from the true intellectuals as the wind winnows the chaff from the grain. Mark Twain restated Ben Franklin's dictum in these words: "We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again - and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore." Ergo, we profit from our mistakes only when the pain does not paralyze us. Ah, yes, Mark Twain's cat. What can we learn from a cat? Or a squirrel, a spider, an ant, a snake, a fly, or--gasp--a worm? Plenty. Perhaps that is why I enjoy the natural world so much. In my youth it was my playground, and today it is my laboratory. Throughout my life it has been my greatest teacher, for there I make my greatest mistakes and see them magnified in the creatures I play with and study. William Wordsworth counsels "Come forth into the light of things, let nature be your teacher." John Lubbock cries "Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books." Why is this so? Because it is impossible to sally forth into the world of nature without getting your hands dirty and making mistake after mistake after mistake. You have to DO something OUT THERE. And, as Sophocles put it, "One must learn by doing the thing; for though you think you know it, you have no certainty, until you try." So, when you make mistakes, don't tarry in your despair. You have just learned a valuable lesson, one well worth the cost. Lift your head, set your jaw, steady your gaze on what lies ahead, and rejoice that you are still alive enough to err! Life is good, but only when it is lived. The dead have ceased to make mistakes, but we have many walking amongst us whose spirits died long ago. Every mistake we make is proof we have not joined that worthless crew. May it ever be so... * TERMITE ENCOUNTERS * SNAKE ENCOUNTERS * SNAKE BITE FIRST AID * SNAKE EXCLUSION * SPIDER ENCOUNTERS FOR 2008 * SPIDER ENCOUNTERS FOR 2007 * SPIDER BITE FIRST AID * SPIDER EXTERMINATION * PUSS CATERPILLAR ENCOUNTERS * PUSS CATERPILLAR FIRST AID * PUSS CATERPILLAR EXTERMINATION * Written by Jerry Cates . Questions? Corrections? Comments? BUG ME RIGHT NOW! ---- Ph: 512-331-1111 ---- E-Mail ---- Privacy ----BugsInTheNews * |