Can we learn from others’ mistakes, or do they have to be our own lessons to learn in the first place? I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately and believe we will–most of us–eventually learn the lessons life is trying to teach us. The question is not if, but when, and at what cost? The time it takes is critical to the process. It’s the cost that counts most.
Time is less consequential because time is not a consequence at all. Time is, in fact, critical to the process of growth. I couldn’t understand some of the complexities as an Army Private, corporate sales rep, or non-profit director that I could understand as an Army NCO, a sales director, or a non-profit executive. I needed more time to mature. More looks inside the sectors. Time to see different approaches to the same problems. Time to see my faults. Time to convert information to understanding. Time–and mentorship–to receive and embrace feedback.
When I got those additional reps, reflections, and understanding, themes started to emerge, such as the need to not immediately say everything I was thinking. The need to listen more than I speak. Apparently, I’m not the only one who has struggled with this. “Even a fool who keeps silent is considered wise; when he closes his lips, he is deemed intelligent (Prov 17:28).” We need time, reps, and reflection to transform us. But at what cost?
Life teaches us wisdom by allowing us to experience the consequences of our actions. Dr. Martin Luther King once famously said, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice," a paraphrase of the original sentiment penned by Unitarian and abolitionist Minister Theodore Parker in 1853. At its roots, these two leaders call our attention to the fact that we exist in a just reality. Even though the course may be long and painful, life will bend back to justice. Reality is created to teach us wisdom. And life is often filled with family, friends, and mentors who try to offer it to us when they see us running along that long arc away from good living.
“Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers. ”
As a young man, I ran from the specter of my father in my mind. I ran violently, bitterly, and viciously to intensity and achievement. I ran headlong into the consequences of that approach when I ended up alone on my mountaintops, having lost sight of my family along the way. It was a costly lesson for me, flush with collateral damage for us all. If I’m being honest, we didn’t have much mentorship in that season other than the cobbled-together, young military families we clung to.
I had plenty of mentorship and advice as a young leader in healthcare sales, though. I just didn’t take it. And I learned some hard lessons in the process, like having a sales district with five open territories is a bad idea. The cost was achieving my district goal, which meant it cost me the commissions my family and I relied upon–a tangible expression of the loss.
It leads me back to that initial question I’m asking myself: “Could I have learned from someone else’s mistakes, or did I have to experience the costs and the consequences for myself?” Knowing myself and my disposition, I know it was the latter. I had to experience the consequences. I had to count the costs myself. What about you? What about your teammates? What about your friends and your family? What about your kids? If I’m honest, that’s where this is the hardest.
Parenting is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Kids are harder than combat. As Blayne often says, “Parenting wouldn’t be so hard if I didn't care so much.” What I find most maddening about it is my children’s inability to learn from my mistakes. I guess I incorrectly assumed that the difference in our circumstances would change the absorption of life lessons. We didn’t have mentors to shepherd us as young adults; our children do! Shouldn’t that magically increase their absorption potential? No. It should not. It decreases their impact potential.
Life will teach them the lessons they need to learn, but I am reminded that they must walk the course and pay the costs themselves. Our role is to stand ready to catch them when they do and to love them well as they bounce back after setbacks. This is why Proverbs 22:6 tells us to “Train a child in the way they should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” It doesn’t say to train a child in the way they should go, and they will never depart from it. In fact, we are told that they will not depart from it when they are old, suggesting they will almost certainly not follow it between that childhood time and their maturity. Time is required. Costs will be accrued.
And though it may be hard to watch because we know how much those consequences hurt, we must stay near them in the process. Holding onto our wise counsel until it is requested as we transition from coaches to advisors in the lives of those we love the most. It’s a hard lesson to learn for me. As it turns out, I’m still learning to keep my mouth shut.
Throughout their adolescence, I often told my children, “It’s as if you are standing on a train track with a freight train barrelling down upon you. And I’m off to the side urging you, ‘Just step off the track,’ but you won’t. And you keep getting run over by the same train.” I thought it was great advice. I was really proud of my vivid illustration. Too proud of it. I ran that play into their young adulthood until they stopped calling.
Turns out that when we are running our journey through life’s lessons, we lose the ability to hear the octave of wisdom’s voice, especially when it comes from our parents’ mouths. But we can always hear the voice of love, especially when we are paying the costs to own life’s greatest lessons.
It really is the cost that counts most. I suppose the best thing we can do is remember what it felt like when we had to pay for life’s lessons and allow those we love to pay for them from their own accounts while caring for them when it hurts the most.
In the end, we may run long and run hard if we wish. Wisdom will wait until the cost becomes payable upon the rocks of reality.
