Wrongedly Wrong Wrong
Gratitude 12/2/2025
I am grateful for the gift of a new day.
My heart is filled with gratitude for the many blessings I have.
I will appreciate the small joys and express my thanks in all circumstances.
Let my attitude of gratitude bring joy to others.
I am grateful for people who have the character to admit they are wrong.
My father-in-law, a very talented electrician, had many sayings that reverberate in my head at appropriate and inapproprite times. One of them was, “I may not be right, but I’m never wrong.” Looking it up, I found that famous film producer, Samuel Goldwyn, said something similar, “I’m willing to admit that I may not be right, but I am never wrong.” That’s like what a marketing manager told me years ago, after his idea didn’t work. “Well, I could have been right.”
Most of us think we are pretty smart, or at least have good judgment, good common sense. We think we can spot a phony, a liar, or a swindler a mile away. It’s really hard when I have invested my energy, money, or faith in a bad idea, to let it go and admit I was wrong.
When I have made a mistake and have been proven wrong, I feel embarrassed and look for a way to rationalize that it wasn’t my fault. A few months ago, on a country road out here, I looked at my phone while I was driving. I looked up when I hit a mailbox and knocked the box off the post. I KNOW it’s STUPID to text or look at your phone while driving and there were no other cars, but IT WAS STUPID and I have no one else to blame but myself. I’m sure something similar happened to our mailbox years ago. I regret that because I was rushed, I did not go back and try to replace the mailbox. The next time I drove by, all the mailboxes were in place, so I couldn’t even tell which one I had hit.
Most of the time our mistakes are not life and death issues. They give us the opportunity to learn, to understand why laws, rules, guidelines are what they are.
It takes humility, courage, and integrity to admit to a mistake. But it is surprisingly easier to do than you think. Years ago at a conference, a speaker at the beginning of his presentation, apologized for the quality of his visuals. He said his “secretary” had given him the wrong ones and it was her fault, not his. The group of educators who made up the audience roundly booed him. It would have been so much better if he had taken responsibility, or not mentioned anything at all. That moment really resonated with me. The rest of his speech did not go well.
Everyone. Everyone makes mistakes. Sometimes we don’t know for a long time whether something was a mistake or not. Sometimes mistakes are inconsequential. Sometimes they result in a disaster. Watching Ken Burns The American Revolution, I realized that even George Washington made some strategic mistakes. Most of the time after a mistake, we have to pick up the pieces and move on, hopefully learning from the mistake.
Admitting a mistake is the first step in recovery. I’m so grateful for people who have the integrity to admit when they have been wrong.