We are all idiots… sometimes. You are. I am. He is. They are. We are all idiots sometimes.
And that’s OK. We can’t be “on” 24/7.
I am reminded of Scott Adams in his book The Dilbert Principle, where he wrote (and I paraphrase here) about an incident with a pager. He changed the battery and it didn’t work anymore. He drove to the store prepared for an epic smack down on the quality of the product. As soon as the service person heard “battery change”, he flip the battery cover open, reversed the battery and closed the cover. All in one, well practiced, motion. The pager worked fine.
In that instance, Scott was an idiot. Yet, me managed to drive a motor vehicle all the way through town without killing anyone or destroying any property.
Today, I proofread a large document, made a bunch of comments, then told the person who needed it that it was ready. She couldn’t find my comments. I replied (in something of a huff) that my comments were in the same file. As soon as I sent that e-mail, I realized that I had saved the file to my desktop and hadn’t uploaded it back to the server.
I was an idiot (and kind of a jerk). I apologized and we went on about our day.
I can’t image that there is anyone who hasn’t gone a week (probably a day) without doing something that others would think was profoundly stupid. More than likely, if someone else did that same thing, the person would call them profoundly stupid.
We aren’t “idiots”. We just don’t think things through all the way, every time. Today, for example, I’m recovering from being ill through Thanksgiving and I’m tired and a little grumpy. I just didn’t think things all the way through. It happens. It doesn’t mean that I’m stupid. Maybe we should call it a momentary lapse of critical thinking. Or, as my mom calls it, a brain fart.
These things happen and it’s best to say sorry, correct the issue, and move on.
I’m OK with making mistakes. And I listen when people I trust correct me. I listen when people I don’t trust try to correct me, but they have a higher burden of evidence. Just saying “you’re wrong” doesn’t mean much from some people.
Anyway, I’ve shared, feel free to share the times you were an idiot. Own up to it and let’s all have a few laughs.
