Benefits of habit “Learn from mistakes”

✓ Improves learning
✓ Improves analytical skills
✓ Makes you better at reflecting on your own actions
✓ Teaches not to judge yourself too harshly
✓ Reduces mistake anxiety

First step:

Spend 5mins reflecting on a mistake you made

Progress:

1. Today, spend 5 minutes reflecting on 1 mistake you made. It can be at work, at school or university, in a social gathering – you pick and analyze what went wrong. Do once this week.
3. Next week, analyze 5 mistakes you made. Do 1 mistake one day and the 2nd mistake – another day.
4. Keep increasing, until you spend 5 minutes every day reflecting on what you have learned from your mistake, or until you run out of mistakes to learn from.
5. When you feel you made a new mistake, spend time analyzing it.
6. You may also increase the analysis time if you feel necessary.

Helpful tips to make it a habit:

✓ Same time is key. Sometimes, 5 minutes can be hard to find, but we recommend, once you do find them, make them always at the same time. We recommend during lunch break or after work.
✓ Trigger your mind. Keep a little journal of what mistakes you made and put it somewhere visible, so you wouldn’t forget about it.
✓ Let the app help. You may use the reminder function of this app to signal when it’s time for reflection.
✓ Reward yourself. Once you have spent a full week reflecting on things that went wrong for you, make sure to reward yourself by spending 5 minutes remembering the times that it all went right and how elated it made you feel. Good vibes are important as well.

Tips for beginners:

✓ Analyzing instead of bashing. There is a big difference between analyzing what went wrong and punishing yourself by replaying the situation in your head. Instead of doing that, let go of all emotion attached to the situation, let it pass you through and leave only actions, no reactions. Then, you may begin analyzing.
✓ When feelings get in the way. Some situations can be more emotionally charged than others. If that is an issue, first spend those 5 minutes draining yourself of emotion. Let it pass, or put some distance in terms of time between you and the situation. Only then analyze it.
✓ Analysis. Once you put together your actions, think what other actions you should have chosen to do instead of what you did. Think about what outcomes would have been possible. Were you in a situation where other actions could have been taken? Think critically on what you should and could have done and keep it in mind or write it down. You never know when it might come in handy.