Learn from Your Mistakes
November 16, 2023

We close your eyes so that we can watch our breath—and watch the mind without a lot of disturbance, a lot of distractions outside, because we really need to keep watch over the mind. Everything we experience in terms of pleasure or pain comes from the actions of the mind. And as the Buddha has been pointing out, we’ve been making a lot of mistakes: looking for happiness in the wrong way, doing things for the sake of happiness that end up causing long-term pain. So we have to keep watch on the mind.

We stay with the breath because that keeps us in the present moment. It also provides us with a good comfortable place to stay, because you can adjust the breath any way you like. Whatever feels good, you can breathe that way. It makes it pleasant to be here—so that it’s easier to stay here, so that you can watch the mind and see where it’s making its mistakes.

Usually, we don’t like to see the mind’s mistakes. But then how are we going to learn if we don’t? So we watch them. Recognize them as mistakes. And then as the Buddha said, if you see a mistake, you resolve not to repeat it. Then have lots of goodwill for yourself, lots of goodwill for other people.

All too often, when we’ve made a mistake, we beat ourselves up over it, but that doesn’t really help. As the Buddha said, that kind of activity actually makes it worse, because it saps our strength to keep on doing the right thing. So recognize a mistake; resolve not to repeat it. Then have goodwill for yourself, realizing that we all make mistakes. But we can all learn from them, too.

So it’s the intention to learn—that’s what makes a difference. People keep on repeating mistakes over and over again without caring. That’s a real problem. But when you care, you vow your best not to repeat the mistake. Then, as the Buddha said, you brighten the world like the moon when it’s released from a cloud at night. There are so many people who continue making the mistakes over and over and over again, and when you point it out to them, they just get more entrenched in their mistakes. That kind of behavior doesn’t help the world at all. It keeps the world dark.

When you recognize a mistake and resolve not to repeat it—and then base that resolve on lots of goodwill for yourself and for other people—then the world becomes a brighter place. Your mind becomes a brighter mind. So tell yourself you’re here to learn. And learning means just that: seeing mistakes and resolving not to repeat them. That’s the best that can be asked of a human being. So try to keep the right attitude in mind.