Terry Sarten: Once you get into adolescence the mistakes come thick and fast

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Eating dirt is a mistake — and some of us learn that lesson by trial and error.

I misheard a book title the other day — it actually was called Living the Life of a Mystic, but upon arriving at my brain via my one good ear I thought it was called Living the Life of a Mistake.

This made much more sense as we all make mistakes ... life is full of them.
It starts in childhood with thinking that, as a small person, you are the centre of the universe.

Most us find out this is a mistake and live with it. There are some who remain convinced they still are the point around which the world revolves but avoid reality but becoming the President of the United States.

It may be a mistake for a toddler to sit in the garden eating dirt and worms but it is a lesson learnt by trial and error.

We head into the school years and discover that mistakes are everywhere waiting to surprise us. Two plus two is four, not more.

Spelling and writing present immense scope for mistakes — plain vs plane; grown and groan; to drive a train or train a driver. The difference between yes, no and maybe is fraught with potential error.

Then we get to more advanced mistaking — concrete is hard, ice creams are soft and melt faster than they can be licked on a sunny day; big brother/sister will yell if you touch their stuff. Saying "I'm not tired' while crying and looking miserable is a mistake because then grown-ups insist it is bedtime even though there is more exciting stuff you want to do.

You get a little older and a little wiser as the mistakes become increasingly complicated.
Forgetting homework, leaving doors open in winter, expecting the cat to understand algebra, deciding to cut your own hair, believing you have superpowers as you leap of out of a tree — these are all life's mistakes. Without them how would we learn?

Once you get into adolescents the mistakes come thick and fast. The girl/boy you like does not know you exist so you never say "Hello" as that might be a mistake.

Years later you find out they did like you but were never brave enough to say "Hello".
Flares have not actually come back in fashion; your cellphone is already vintage — and so are your parents who you think will never understand you, and you cannot see why they don't understand why this is a fact.

The mistakes keep happening even though you hope they will still stop. You sit your driving test and get so nervous you mistake the indicators for the wipers; you go to a party and discover everyone is in a costume but you (cover this mistake by acting as if you knew that all along, so came dressed as yourself).

You think you can tango to country music and — by mistake — create a whole new genre. You tell everyone that asks that (a) it is so new that it could be mistaken for a mistake; (b) everyone makes mistakes.

Mistakes are life's way of telling us we are not in a perfect world.

But there are certainly some mistakes not worth making, such as driving without a seatbelt, thinking it is okay to hit people, or thinking you know everything.
Believing only other people make mistakes is probably one of the biggest mistakes anyone can make. That is called being an idiot.

Terry Sarten (aka Tel) is a writer, musician and busy living the life of a mistake