quotations about mistakes
A step backward, after making a wrong turn, is a step in the right direction.
KURT VONNEGUT
Player Piano
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
Do you know what it is like,
to lie in bed awake;
with thoughts to haunt
you every night,
of all your past mistakes.
LANG LEAV
Love & Misadventure
Every step that I take is another mistake to you.
LINKIN PARK
"Numb"
I don't make mistakes. I make predictions which immediately turn out to be wrong.
TONY BENN
Arguments for Socialism
To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact.
CHARLES DARWIN
letter to A. Stephen Wilson, March 5, 1879
It is a very hard and troublesome thing to dispose of whole, half, and quarter-mistakes; to sift them and assign the portion of truth to its proper place.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
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
It is only an error of judgment to make a mistake, but it argues an infirmity of character to adhere to it when discovered.
CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE
Intuitions and Summaries of Thought
We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.
STEVE MARABOLI
Unapologetically You
Mistakes occur through haste, never through doing a thing leisurely.
CHINESE PROVERB
Mistakes are road signs pointing you back to the proper path.
DARIN PENZERA
Heroic Egoism
Even honest men mistake oftener in their own favor than in other peoples.
FULKE GREVILLE
Maxims, Characters and Reflections
To err is human, but it feels divine.
MAE WEST
The Wit and Wisdom of Mae West
Those who learn from their mistakes, are achievers and those who keep on crying on their failures, are losers.
SANJEEV KUMAR
31 Distinctive Qualities for Becoming Rich
When you make a mistake, don't make a second one -- keeping it to yourself. Own up. The time to sort out rotten eggs is at the nest. The deeper you hide them in the case the longer they stay in circulation, and the worse impression they make when they finally come to the breakfast table.
GEORGE HORACE LORIMER
Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son
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
Lack of recent information is responsible for more mistakes of judgment than erroneous reasoning.
MATTHEW ARNOLD
attributed, "The Living Law", Harper's Weekly, February 26, 1916
We ought not to look back, unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dear bought experience. To enveigh against things that are past and irremediable, is unpleasing; but to steer clear of the shelves and rocks we have struck upon, is the part of wisdom, equally as incumbent on political as other men, who have their own little bark, or that of others, to navigate through the intricate paths of life, or the trackless ocean, to the haven of security and rest.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
letter to Major-General Armstrong, March 26, 1781
They say we learn from mistakes,
that's why they mistake me.
LIL WAYNE
"Blunt Blowin", Tha Carter IV