Roger Moroney: Why don't we learn from our mistakes?

Roger Moroney's neat pile of autumn leaves was whisked away by the wind. Photo / NZME

There's an old saying along the lines of "you learn from your mistakes".

Which is all very well and good and thoughtful and sensible but it doesn't really ring completely true because it's easy to make the same mistake twice … or three times or more.

Some of that may have to do with what I suspect is a strange genetic component of the human brain.

A thing that whispers in our inner ear that "yeah, go on, give it a shot, you won't stuff it up this time".

Or "take a chance, it won't go wrong this time".

Meanwhile, there is another component within us that shakes its head and quietly whispers in the other inner ear "you know what happened last time" but it is the "she'll be right" whisperer which so often takes the reins.

It's only when the give-it-a-goers are cleaning up the same sort of wreckage they cleaned up last time they took the "she'll be right" path that they start shaking their heads and wonder why they can't seem to learn from their mistakes.

So yes, we do learn from our mistakes, but we still seem to be able to repeat them.

I suspect it is simply a mysterious ingredient of human nature.

Nature, huh?

A couple of autumns back I decided the time was right to rake up the sea of leaves across the backyard and driveway.

A one-hit job.

So off I went and after about 30 minutes I had built up a pyramid of leaves.

Which I left, with the intention of piling them all into the fadge later in the day, as I wanted to do some clearing up of shrubbery beside the house.

Then I could scoop it all up, again in one hit, and take it all out to the green waste place.

It was whilst dealing with the shrubbery the wind got up - quickly.

Oh yes, it had been forecast but hey, they don't always gets it right I wrongly concluded.

So the pyramid was torn apart and the leaves all went back to their original places - and beyond.

Not the sort of mistake I would make again, I fumed to myself.

But nope, I was fuming again a couple of months back, as I repeated the whole badly scripted exercise.

The wind had the last laugh.

Roger Moroney

Wind also had the last laugh at a school production we went to many years back when one of the young lads taking part, during a quiet moment of the play, let one go.

His stagemates all dissolved in laughter as did those in the audience who had heard his non-scripted gaseous statement.

It transpired he had been told not to eat too much before the show, as the previous year he had overdone the snacks and yep, farted on that occasion as well.

He could clearly learn his lines but was unable to learn from his previous mistake.

A part of this whole script is timing, of course.

Get the timing right. In that kid's case he should have waited for a noisy moment in the play, and in cases like mine make sure to take the time to read the weather forecast.

However, those among us who find it challenging to learn from their mistakes are a boon to council parking businesses.

You overstay and cop a fine and shake your head and tell yourself you'll be more careful with the time … next time.

But next time it's "oh, should be right for a little while" and the meter money stays put in the pocket.

And yep, upon return there's a wee slice of folded paper under the windscreen wiper.

They earn from our mistakes.