If you find yourself struggling to admit when you’re wrong or judging yourself harshly for “oops” moments, maybe these quotes about mistakes will help inspire you to cut yourself (and others) a break.
Look, there isn’t a person alive who hasn’t made a mistake. Not one. Period. Yet, not only do we try to sweep our own screw-ups under the rug, we treat people like they’re beneath us when they screw up. It’s bonkers, really.
Rather than feel ashamed of yourself- or shame others- for making mistakes, try learning from them. Own up to them. Embrace them for what they are- valuable life lessons. Apologize when necessary. Then move on.
Inspirational Quotes about Mistakes
Here are some of my favorite quotes about mistakes to inspire you to do all of the above.
I put each quote in text beneath it for those who can’t see the images, and to make copying and pasting easier for those who want to save the quotes for their own blog posts, journals, etc. After all, I only own the images, not the words themselves.
Head’s up, linked book titles are affiliate links. I get a minuscule commission if you decide to buy something through them. Still, it helps, and it doesn’t cost you anything extra. 🙂
1. We learn from failure…
“We learn from failure, not from success!”
― Bram Stoker, Dracula
2. Never feel badly about making mistakes…
“You must never feel badly about making mistakes … as long as you take the trouble to learn from them. For you often learn more by being wrong for the right reasons than you do by being right for the wrong reasons.”
― Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth
3. The only thing one never regrets…
“Nowadays most people die of a sort of creeping common sense, and discover when it is too late that the only things one never regrets are one’s mistakes.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
4. Failure is instructive…
“Failure is instructive. The person who really thinks learns quite as much from his failures as from his successes.”
― John Dewey
5. Freedom to make mistakes…
“Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
6. Confidence turns to pride…
“Confidence turns into pride only when you are in denial of your mistakes.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy
7. People make mistakes…
“At an early age I learned that people make mistakes, and you have to decide if their mistakes are bigger than your love for them.”
― Angie Thomas, The Hate U Give
8. Good judgement comes from experience…
“Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.”
― Rita Mae Brown, Alma Mater
9. If an apology is followed by…
“If an apology is followed by an excuse or a reason, it means they are going to commit same mistake again they just apologized for.”
― Amit Kalantri
10. Don’t make the same mistake twice
“Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time.”
― George Bernard Shaw
11. Those who do nothing…
“It is only those who do nothing who makes no mistake.”
― Peter Kropotkin, Anarchism: A Collection of Revolutionary Writings
12. Basic rules of the universe
“One of the basic rules of the universe is that nothing is perfect. Perfection simply doesn’t exist…..Without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist”
― Stephen Hawking
13. The greatest mistake you can make…
“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.”
― Elbert Hubbard
14. Take one anyway…
“If you are afraid to take a chance, take one anyway. What you don’t do can create the same regrets as the mistakes you make.”
― Iyanla Vanzant
15. Sharp people learn from mistakes of others
“Smart people learn from their mistakes. But the real sharp ones learn from the mistakes of others.”
― Brandon Mull, Fablehaven
16. What a waste…
“What a waste my life would be without all the beautiful mistakes I’ve made.”
― Alice Bag
17. We are all flawed…
“We are all flawed, my dear. Every one of us. And believe me, we’ve all made mistakes. You’ve just got to take a good hard look at yourself, change what needs to be changed, and move on, pet.”
― Lauren Myracle
18. No fear of perfection…
“Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.”
― Salvador Dali
19. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes…
“You’re afraid of making mistakes. Don’t be. Mistakes can be profited by. Man, when I was young I shoved my ignorance in people’s faces. They beat me with sticks. By the time I was forty my blunt instrument had been honed to a fine cutting point for me. If you hide your ignorance, no one will hit you and you’ll never learn.”
― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
20. Not a mistake, a choice…
“You can never make the same mistake twice because the second time you make it, it’s not a mistake, it’s a choice.”
― Steven Denn
21. My mistakes are dead to me…
“The mistakes I’ve made are dead to me. But I can’t take back the things I never did.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
22. We learn mistakes are bad, but…
“In school we learn that mistakes are bad, and we are punished for making them. Yet, if you look at the way humans are designed to learn, we learn by making mistakes. We learn to walk by falling down. If we never fell down, we would never walk.”
― Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad, Poor Dad
23. Courage, not weakness…
“It takes guts and humility to admit mistakes. Admitting we’re wrong is courage, not weakness.”
― Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
24. Make new mistakes…
“So that’s my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make New Mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody’s ever made before. Don’t freeze, don’t stop, don’t worry that it isn’t good enough, or it isn’t perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life.”
― Neil Gaiman
25. Anyone who has never made a mistake…
“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
― Albert Einstein
Making mistakes is a natural and unavoidable part of life. But for some reason, we tend to judge ourselves harshly when things go wrong. These 25 quotes about mistakes are meant to inspire you to let go of your self-judgement and be kinder to yourself.
We’re all human, none of us is perfect. We all make mistakes. Some mistakes can be big and hurtful — others are just small. And some we never even notice have happened until much later in life. Yet despite this, small or big, we end up burying big mistakes in our minds and beating ourselves up with them for the rest of our lives. And this can be for something as trivial as spilling coffee when you were 8 years old or something as serious as hurting a loved one deeply without knowing it. Either way, the result is still the same- regret, embarrassment and self-defeating thoughts that last long after the mistake has been forgotten by everyone around you.
You know what’s better than reading about others’ mistakes? Not making them in the first place. Sure, you’ll still mess up and make mistakes. We all do. You simple have to look at them as a stepping stone to becoming a better person who can learn from those mistakes, grow from the situation, and blow the door wide open of possibilities. Self-growth is critical to having a fulfilling life. Don’t wait until it’s too late to start learning and growing because you avoided being open to making or receiving feedback.