Learning from our mistakes

It seems natural that we will solve the problems by doing more, making more, talking or studying more. Complexity, in economic or in psychological terms, generates activity. We can easily find ourselves running around in meaningless circles, trying to find meaning. But the more we suspect the hopelessness of it, the more we have to run to evade it. Eventually pride has a fall and then, through the hurt in that fall, there is a great oppor-tunity to come to our senses. It is probably after that fall that we begin to meditate, or at least to begin seriously to listen to the teaching of a tradition that connects us without interruption to the source of consciousness where humanity is simple, humble, and in the truth. To enter upon this path of meditation is to find a way that is in direct contact with the awakening of human consciousness. But this is not a going back. We have to go forward after a fall. There is no point in going back to where you were before you fell. So, to begin to meditate means to learn from your mistakes. 

The Selfless Self by Laurence Freeman OSB