We only learn in retrospective

This phrase got stuck in my head after I heard it in Debbie Millman’s “Design Matters” podcast episode. For me, this show is truly enlightening. It always puts me in a good mood and teaches me something new about a design field I didn’t know about.

For some reason, this statement made so much sense to me in a way that keeps resonating in my mind months after. If you think about it, we are in life learning everything as we go, figuring out how and why to be, not knowing if we are making the right moves. All in a weird timing.

As a control freak, this is terrifying to me. It would be nice to have it figured out, just as easy as I know what I’m going to have for breakfast tomorrow. Yet it doesn’t work like that. There’s no way to have it all planned and more important, there’s no need for that.

Sometimes we just need to let our stories unfold, be modified by context and by feelings. Embrace the mistakes as ours and take the best lessons out of it. It is only with time we get the chance to digest and realize if we did it right.

I believe that by acknowledging this I give myself permission to not know everything right away. I give myself a chance to embrace new adventures and to let it sink in later. Since there’s basically not much else to do, we might as well do it with grace.