Mistakes are Opportunities
This is a story about a famous research scientist who had made several very
important medical breakthroughs. He was being interviewed by a newspaper
reporter who asked him why he thought he was able to
be so much more creative than the average person. What set him so far apart
from others?
He responded that, in his opinion, it all came from an experience with his
mother that occurred when he was about two years old. He had been trying to
remove a bottle of milk from the refrigerator when he lost
his grip on the slippery bottle and it fell, spilling its contents all over
the kitchen floor—a veritable sea of milk!
When his mother came into the kitchen, instead of yelling at him, giving him a
lecture, or punishing him, she said, "Robert, what a great and wonderful mess
you have made! I have rarely seen such a huge
puddle of milk. Well, the damage has already been done. Would you like to get
down and play in the milk for a few minutes before we clean it up?"
Indeed, he did. After a few minutes, his mother said, "You know, Robert,
whenever you make a mess like this, eventually you have to clean it up and
restore everything to its proper order. So, how would you
like to do that? We could use a sponge, a towel, or a mop. Which do you
prefer?" He chose the sponge and together they cleaned up the spilled milk.
His mother then said, "You know, what we have here is a failed experiment in
how to effectively carry a big milk bottle with two tiny hands. Let's go out
in the back yard and fill the bottle with water and see if
you can discover a way to carry it without dropping it." The little boy
learned that if he grasped the bottle at the top near the lip with both hands,
he could carry it without dropping it. What a wonderful lesson!
This renowned scientist then remarked that it was at that moment that he knew
he didn't need to be afraid to make mistakes. Instead, he learned that
mistakes were just opportunities for learning something
new, which is, after all, what scientific experiments are all about. Even if
the experiment "doesn't work," we usually learn something valuable from it
This is an extract from a forwarded mail. I decided to put this here since it signifies something that we all missed in our childhood.
This is a story about a famous research scientist who had made several very
important medical breakthroughs. He was being interviewed by a newspaper
reporter who asked him why he thought he was able to
be so much more creative than the average person. What set him so far apart
from others?
He responded that, in his opinion, it all came from an experience with his
mother that occurred when he was about two years old. He had been trying to
remove a bottle of milk from the refrigerator when he lost
his grip on the slippery bottle and it fell, spilling its contents all over
the kitchen floor—a veritable sea of milk!
When his mother came into the kitchen, instead of yelling at him, giving him a
lecture, or punishing him, she said, "Robert, what a great and wonderful mess
you have made! I have rarely seen such a huge
puddle of milk. Well, the damage has already been done. Would you like to get
down and play in the milk for a few minutes before we clean it up?"
Indeed, he did. After a few minutes, his mother said, "You know, Robert,
whenever you make a mess like this, eventually you have to clean it up and
restore everything to its proper order. So, how would you
like to do that? We could use a sponge, a towel, or a mop. Which do you
prefer?" He chose the sponge and together they cleaned up the spilled milk.
His mother then said, "You know, what we have here is a failed experiment in
how to effectively carry a big milk bottle with two tiny hands. Let's go out
in the back yard and fill the bottle with water and see if
you can discover a way to carry it without dropping it." The little boy
learned that if he grasped the bottle at the top near the lip with both hands,
he could carry it without dropping it. What a wonderful lesson!
This renowned scientist then remarked that it was at that moment that he knew
he didn't need to be afraid to make mistakes. Instead, he learned that
mistakes were just opportunities for learning something
new, which is, after all, what scientific experiments are all about. Even if
the experiment "doesn't work," we usually learn something valuable from it
This is an extract from a forwarded mail. I decided to put this here since it signifies something that we all missed in our childhood.
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