What Happens When You Make a Mistake?

"I practice a type of therapy called Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP). I fell in love with this method over two decades ago for many reasons, including that it helps people heal their symptoms, not only manage them with medication or CBT. AEDP gets people out of their head and into their body so that they can fully process their stuck emotions that have led to anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem."

"We have a saying in AEDP that goes: It's not what happens. It's what happens next that matters. This wisdom can be applied when we make mistakes. We can remedy our mistakes, whether it is a little mistake, like cleaning up a spill, or if it is a big mistake, like having to change one's career. Too many of my patients learned another message about making mistakes. They learned, "When I make a mistake, I should beat myself up.""

Mistakes are inevitable and remediable; people can pick themselves up and find solutions calmly instead of self-punishment. Accelerated Experiential Dynamic Psychotherapy (AEDP) helps heal symptoms by bringing attention from cognition into bodily experience so stuck emotions underlying anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem can be fully processed. The critical factor is the response after a mistake: compassionate repair transforms errors into opportunities for learning, while berating oneself or others creates fear of mistakes and inhibits exploration and growth. Small mistakes like cleaning up a spill and major mistakes like career changes can be remedied through repair. Cultivating calm, solution-focused responses reduces a punishing inner voice and supports resilience.

Read at Psychology Today