The English poet Alexander Pope (1688-1744) said in one of his poems, ‘To err is human; to forgive, divine.’ This saying has now become a well-known proverb. It is a fact that everyone makes mistakes. This is a part of human nature.
When one makes a mistake, there are two possible kinds of responses. The first response is to become regretful. One who is full of regret will become disheartened after every mistake. This is the negative aspect of making a mistake.
There is also a positive aspect of a mistake. That is, it encourages you to engage in introspection and self-reassessment. When you do this, your mistake will turn into a mistake plus. This is bound to activate your mind. It will lead to brainstorming. It will increase your creativity and produce a thinking process that may lead to the capacity for better re-appraisal of yourself and an increased ability to analyse things. A mistake becomes a mistake plus when it awakens your mind.
A mistake is an error or fault resulting from poor judgment. If you have a positive mind, your mistake will motivate you to try to find out where you went wrong. This kind of rethinking will open up new possibilities to you. Thus, in an indirect way, the mistake will become a means to climb to new heights of success in life.
Maulana Wahiduddin Khan is an Islamic spiritual scholar who has authored over 200 books on Islam, spirituality, and peaceful coexistence in a multi-ethnic society.