When We Make Mistakes

  No matter how much we try to live the Stoic ideal, we will slip up, we will make mistakes.  We will get angry or sad when things go wrong, we will be happy when things go well.  That is natural; we are flesh and blood creatures, not marble statues.  Perhaps things go well at work and you are congratulated, or something goes wrong and you are called on the carpet.  We try to remember that the events themselves are out of our control, and thus indifferent, but we will react nonetheless.  What do we do then?

  The first thing to remember is that must not fall into the trap of thinking of mistakes in terms of sin, in the Judeo-Christian sense, nor in terms of karma in the Buddhist or Hindu sense.  A mistake is a mistake, an event that is passed.  In and of itself, it does not need to be atoned for, but learned from.  Think of a mistake in these terms: if you are target shooting and miss the target, do you need to get down on your knees and repent for missing the bull's eye?  No, you get up, see where you made the mistake, and try again.  Perhaps your breathing was wrong, or your trigger grip was incorrect, or you did not account for wind.  You see what you did wrong, correct the mistake, and see if there is any improvement.  With practice you will get better and better.

  Look again at the chariot imagery.  Your intellect is the driver.  Sometimes, the horses--the emotions and drives-will get spooked, perhaps by an animal or something else that startles them.  There may be a pothole or a bump in the road that forces the chariot off the track.  Once you have regained control, you keep practicing until you master the rules of the road, until the ride is smooth.  This is how we must treat mistakes in judgement, as opportunities to learn, not as sins for which we must beg forgiveness.