quotations about mistakes
To err is human, but it feels divine.
MAE WEST
The Wit and Wisdom of Mae West
However temperate we may be, we shall be sure to make mistakes enough in the world, and bring upon ourselves enough of trouble.
GEORGE MOGRIDGE
Old Humphrey's Address
Mistakes are, after all, the foundations of truth, and if a man does not know what a thing is, it is at least an increase in knowledge if he knows what it is not.
C. G. JUNG
C. G. Jung: Psychological Reflections
When people once are in the wrong,
Each line they add is much too long;
Who fastest walks, but walks astray,
Is only furthest from his way.
MATTHEW PRIOR
Alma
Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize?
MARCUS AURELIUS
Meditations
A sound discretion is not so much indicated by never making a mistake, as by never repeating it.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
Mistakes are the growing pains of wisdom, the assessments we pay on our stock of experience, the raw material of error to be transformed into higher living. Without them there would be no individual growth, no progress, no conquest.
WILLIAM GEORGE JORDAN
The Crown of Individuality
What an unchallenging life it would be if we always got things right on the first go.
RANSOM RIGGS
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Behold the truth
Whenever heart may ache
There is a glory
In a great mistake.
NATHALIA CRANE
"Imperfection", Swear By the Night and Other Poems
Mistakes are a form of feedback. Every error tells us what we need to correct. As we correct each mistake, we get nearer to the behavioral sequence that works best.
JOHN BRADSHAW
Healing the Shame that Binds You
I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being--forgive me--rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger.
J. K. ROWLING
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
I could take the greatest deal-makers of all time and they've always had something that didn't quite work out. You never want to put yourself in the position where something not working out is bigger than what you are and therefore takes you down. It's got to be in smaller chunks. In all cases, I want to learn something from things that didn't quite work out and learn, so that it doesn't happen again or so that in the future, you make great decisions. You don't want to make the same mistake twice and you have to learn that early on in your life.
DONALD TRUMP
Forbes, October 3, 2011
Truly even he errs that is wiser than the wise.
AESCHYLUS
fragment
There are people who make no mistakes because they never wish to do anything worth doing.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
You are not a mistake. You are not a problem to be solved. But you won't discover this until you are willing to stop banging your head against the wall of shaming and caging and fearing yourself.
GENEEN ROTH
Women, Food and God: An Unexpected Path to Almost Everything
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected.
G. K. CHESTERTON
Illustrated London News, April 19, 1924
Even honest men mistake oftener in their own favor than in other peoples.
FULKE GREVILLE
Maxims, Characters and Reflections
The cautious seldom err.
CONFUCIUS
Analects
Every step that I take is another mistake to you.
LINKIN PARK
"Numb"
Everyone thinks I'm a smart arse who can solve any bloody problem. I'm not. I'm just a very old businessman and a very experienced businessman who made every mistake in the book and can recognise one when I see one.
JOHN HARVEY-JONES
The Telegraph, January 10, 2008