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Accepting Infallibility: Success Starts With Failure
Our Anti-Progress and Anti-Success Culture
In a culture that rewards perfection, they wring our hands about getting things wrong. The fear of failure in getting the wrong answers holds us hostage to our egos, which don’t want to own up to their mistakes.
Failure, even in laboratories, threatens to derail PhD candidates. But these failures block important innovation. Very little would get done if we moralised and personalised everything we do every day.
The organisation is full of ‘terror management’.
The Ego’s Battle Against Admitting Wrong
At the core of our aversion to error is the ego. It’s that part of our psyche that seeks acceptance and shuns rejection. A mistake is seen as an affront to our sense of self and our status in society, and the prospect brings with it strong anxiety.
This is because to be wrong is often equated with being bad, weak or flawed. Hence the ego mounts its defences: the post-rationalisations that maintain or restore our belief in our competence, as described by psychologist Jennifer interweave with our impulse to shift blame to others.
