This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "Being Wrong" by Kathryn Schulz. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.
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Why is it so hard to admit when you’re wrong? What if there were a way to make this process easier and more beneficial?
In her book Being Wrong, Kathryn Schulz explores the concept of error and how to accept being wrong. She offers insights on embracing uncertainty, dealing with change, and viewing mistakes as opportunities for growth.
Read more to discover how to accept being wrong and turn the experience into a positive one.
Accepting That You’re Wrong
Though Schulz often claims that not all mistakes are bad, responding to them poorly never ends well, and the results of denial can sometimes be disastrous. Whether it’s minor or major in scope, the healthiest way to deal with a mistake is to accept it and use it to grow. To be ready for this, you have to be open to the possibility that you can be wrong, acknowledge that your beliefs are always changing, and face up to the fact that learning how to accept being wrong is a never-ending struggle.
The upside of learning you’ve been wrong about something is that it opens you up to change and exploration. First, however, Schulz recommends that you cultivate an openness to the chance you could be wrong about a great many things. The manufacturing industry already models this by thinking through every possible way the systems they design might fail. On a personal level, you can start to practice this by using the language of equivocation—“maybe, possibly, I’m not sure”—instead of speaking and thinking from a place of certainty. Our culture paints uncertainty as weakness, but that’s just another way that our culture may be wrong. Uncertainty helps you stay open to error and cushions the blow of admitting to mistakes.
(Shortform note: Schulz isn’t the only author to recommend doubt as a pathway to growth. In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson offers a three-step process to cultivating doubt as a practical skill. The first step is to ask yourself what if you’re wrong in any particular situation. The follow-up question is “What would the consequences be if you’re wrong?” The last step is to think about those consequences. None of Manson’s steps require admitting that you’re wrong—Manson, like Schulz, only asks that you leave the option on the table and do the mental work to take it seriously.)
To be sure, if you learn that you’ve been wrong in a way that’s fundamental to your sense of self—something that might change your religious beliefs or whether you want to continue in your career—you’re going to go through a painful transition. Nevertheless, Schulz points out that our identities, based on our changeable beliefs, are always in flux. Change is a natural, if painful, part of life that we all experience in one way or another. It may be easier for such change to happen slowly, but there’s always a sense of loss associated with it. The trick is to change your attitude toward being wrong so that you can see it for the lessons that it brings instead of the pain it makes you feel.
(Shortform note: Since Schulz defines right and wrong in terms of change instead of truth, then the entire question of making peace with your mistakes is really a question of how well you handle change. In Switch, Chip and Dan Heath make the case that change can be successfully managed if you engage both your rational side and your emotions. You can guide your intellect through difficult changes by seeking out the stories of those who’ve gone through a similar experience while leveraging both positive and negative feelings to push change forward, depending on the context of your situation. Above all, they recommend making sure to celebrate progress along your path toward change rather than regretting the mistakes that came before.)
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Like what you just read? Read the rest of the world's best book summary and analysis of Kathryn Schulz's "Being Wrong" at Shortform.
Here's what you'll find in our full Being Wrong summary:
- Why you shouldn’t try to completely avoid making mistakes
- The reasons why you get things wrong
- How to make mistakes without falling victim to shame and denial
