How to NOT Let Life Beat You Up When You Make a Mistake

Have you ever had the greatest of intentions to try to do something nice for someone, to try to do something helpful, to try to be an encouragement or a blessing for someone and you end up making them cry or you hurt their feelings or you alienate them from you? Well, I've done that. Today. I'm going to share with you how that happens and what we're going to be able to do about it. What you're going to get today is to learn how not to let life beat you up. I'll say that again because all of us have had the experience of life beating us up unexpectedly or in a surprising manner.

Welcome to becoming wiser with Dr. Robert A. Rohm, author and world renowned public speaker, as he shares stories involving his experiences and lessons learned in a good, spirited, positive and fun way. Here's Dr. Robert A. Rome.

Several years ago, I had a wonderful uncle. His name was Uncle Frank, and he's passed away now, so I can share this story. And Uncle Frank was one of our dear family members. Well, for Christmas one year, we all drew names. Everybody in the family. We all would draw a name. We had a large family. So everybody draws somebody's name and that's the person you had to give a gift to. It was a lot of fun. I'm sure you've done something like this. Well, who would have ever thought that drawing names could turn into a tearful experience? Well, let me tell you what happened. Let me tell you what I did, and let me explain to you how it came about.

As it was getting closer and closer to Christmas, I decided, you know what? I love my family and I'm going to get everybody in the family something for Christmas. So I went Christmas shopping. And even though I had drawn Uncle Frank's name, I went out and I got presents for everybody in the family because I just wanted everybody to have a good Christmas. Well, Christmas day came and the family all showed up and we had lunch and afternoon we're going to open presents. And everybody started opening up the presents. And oh boy, was everybody happy and excited that they got a present for me. And I wasn't doing it honestly, I wasn't doing it for any notoriety. I wasn't doing it for any praise. I just like people. I just like my family. And so I decided I wanted everybody in the family to have a present. And so they were all so happy. They were all thrilled. Oh, look what Robert got me. Well, look what he got me. And so I don't know if you're thinking ahead with me or not. But where this is leading. But it caught me off guard, and it may catch you off guard, too. You see, I drew Uncle Frank's name, and I got him a present.

But everybody else got one present from the one person who drew their name. Except the fact I jacked the whole thing up by giving everyone in the family a present. So everyone in the family got two presents that day for Christmas. One from the person that drew their name and one for me, except for Uncle Frank. Uncle Frank only got one present.

Uncle Frank got the present that I got him because I drew his name.

And in a little while, everyone noticed that Uncle Frank was sitting there with tears streaming down his cheeks.

And everybody said, are you okay? And he tried to hide it. He tried to not be pushy or selfish about it, but it kind of hurt his feelings that everybody there got two presents except him. He only got one.

And it hurt his feelings. Now listen carefully. Hear my heart. I know you might say, well, he was a grown man. He should have figured out real quickly that you weren't out to get him. You drew his name, and he got a present. So that's what was supposed to happen. And that's what did happen. Now listen carefully. This is what makes me different. This is why I want to be the kind of person that I'm growing into. Not, I haven't arrived yet. I'm still on the journey. So listen carefully. I should have thought that through a little better. I should have realized, you know what? Everybody's going to have two presents because I'm getting everybody one. And they're going to get one from someone else. Except Uncle Frank. He's going to be sitting there with one gift. I felt like a dog. I know. I can hear you right now, and I love you and I appreciate you thinking, well, he. He got his present. What's the big deal? The big deal is this. I should have been more thoughtful. I can't control the universe. I can't control other people. But I can control my actions and my behaviors and my words. Now, unfortunately, Uncle Frank, who I loved and respected, he let life beat him up. In other words, he let something happen in his life that hurt his feelings, caused, caught him off guard, and made him have a bad or a poor Christmas. We got past it. I apologized to him. After he cried, I said, I should have been more thoughtful. Please forgive me. Isn't that interesting? That happened decades ago, and I still remember it. I still remember it. And it would be real easy for me to, on this podcast today, to say, well, you know, What? Too bad. Uncle Frank, you got your gift. Grow up. You're a man. I don't know why you're making a big deal out of nothing. You know what? I don't choose to think that way. Here's the way I choose to think. How could I have done that better? How could. If I get an opportunity to work with people and to have a second chance in a similar situation, why not do better? Why not think things through? May I tell you this, and this is just the truth. I have learned from that. I usually give everybody in my family several Christmas presents, and that's been going on for decades. Not because I'm so wonderful or I'm so wealthy or I'm so popular. It's just. I like doing that. So nobody gets just one gift. Everybody gets several gifts. I don't want people to have a bad Christmas. I don't want them to have a bad experience. Now, the reason I tell you that is it's so easy to let life beat you up. One day, I was in the backyard playing baseball with some of my friends. Somebody pulled up in the. In a car beside our house. I thought they were looking at me. I thought they were talking to me. They said, would you like to go swimming in our pool? I said, well, just a minute. Let me go ask my mom. And they said to me, we weren't talking to you. We were talking to Kenneth. Oh, talking about. Hurt my feelings. Talking about let life beat me up. I thought they were asking me could I go swimming. No, we're not talking to you. We were talking to Kenneth. Well, I was not only had my feelings hurt, I also was embarrassed because I was all set to stop the baseball game, go get my bathing suit and go swimming with them. You know, you would have thought I would have asked myself one question. Who are these people? I don't even know who they are. But they wanted me to go swimming. I wanted to go, except they weren't talking to me at all. So you see, I learned another good lesson. Life beat me up that day. But here's what I learned. But be careful what you say to people. Be careful that who you're talking to knows that you're talking to them and not to someone else. I had the great privilege of working with Zig Ziglar for many, many years. And Zig used to say this. I'm not going to ease up, give up, back up, let up, or shut up until I'm taken up. Zig was the best example of anybody ever met that didn't Let life beat him up. But may I tell you something? And I don't know how much you know about Zig Ziglar and his life story. Life beat Zig up a lot. One day, Zig came home and he was all excited about some new venture he was in. And one of his children said, oh, no, dad. What are you into now? It hurt his feelings because he was looking for methodologies and ways to do life better. And so that caused him to make some mistakes along the way, whether it was selling cookware or whether it was being involved in other items that he was selling, which the cookware. There's another good example. When he sold cookware, he would go into a house, he would do a presentation. He would make dinner for the people who were there. This is a true story. One night, after he made dinner with the cookware, he asked the people, would you like to buy a set of the cookware? One elderly lady, she said, I would. Zig said, oh, that's so great. I'm so glad you like this cookware. I tell you what, I've got to go do another presentation tonight, but I'll come by your house tomorrow and I'll bring the cookware and we can get all settled. She said, okay. Well, the next day, Zig went to her house, and when he got there, he said. She looked at him and said, you know, I've had some time to think about it, and. And I don't think I want the cookware after all. Zig said, talking about, let life beating you up. I had somebody who was trying to give me money for a presentation to buy the cookware. I was trying to sell them, but I didn't have time to take the money because I had another presentation talking about a bad salesman. And ladies and gentlemen, if you're listening to this today and you're in sales and someone's trying to hand you money, it's a good idea to take it. It's a good idea to close the deal and make the sale while they're standing right there in front of you trying to close the deal so you can make the sale. See how easy it would be for Zig to beat himself up, to make a mistake and say, I didn't even know what I was doing yet. He overcame all of it because he lived by the motto of don't let life beat you up. There's a lot of opportunities. Listen, if you're married, if you have children, if you have parents, if you have a job, if you have a car, if you get on the road, if you go into a restaurant, there's opportunities every day for life to beat you up. It just so happens that things challenge you. And when they do, you have to decide whether or not you're going to give up and quit. I have a little poem here. It's on my desk. I got it and I want to read it to you because there's very few. I like to keep things in front of me that remind me of things in life and how to do life better. The title of this, and maybe you've heard it. It's called Don't Quit. When things go wrong, as they sometimes will. When the road you're trudging seems all uphill. When the funds are low and the debts are high and you want to smile but you have to sigh. When care is pressing you down a bit. Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is odd with its twists and turns as every one of us sometimes learns. And many a failure turns about.

When you might have won.

Had you stuck it out. Don't give up though the pace seems slow, you may succeed with another blow. Success is failure turned inside out the silver tent of the clouds of doubt. And you never can tell how close you are to it may be near when it seems so far, so stick to the fight when you're hardest hit, it's when things seem worse that you must not quit. I just really like that because it helps me to see that when life beats me up, don't give up. I live life by the 8020 principle. Many of you have heard the prado principle. It's 80%. And here's what I mean by the 8020 principle. For life. 80% of life is really good. It's really good if you stop and think about it. I mean, you have plenty to eat. Friends, opportunity, years. 100, 200 years ago, people got up in the morning and lived their whole life trying to find something to eat. Now we have restaurants everywhere, in shopping centers and malls and food courts. I mean, life for us is. We live better today than kings and queens of old. We have air conditioning and heat. We don't have to get up and go chop down a tree in order that we can have firewood. We just turn on the thermostat and warm our house up or cool it down, whatever we need to do. And we just live in such. So 80%. And I realize it may not be this a hundred percent of the time, but here's where I'm going. 80% of life is really, really Good. You have plenty to eat. Friends, family, the ball game, something to look forward to. But let me. May I be honest with you? About 20%. Life is not going to go the way you want it to. There's going to be a problem. Somebody's going to walk out on somebody. You're going to run out of gas, You're. You're going to lose a job. There's going to be a wayward child. There may be a family member to cause you some real heartache. Don't let life beat you up. 80% of it's great when you go through the 20%. Just realize it's the 20% that's making the 80% possible is the 20% that's building you. Like muscles in a gym are built by the weights offering resistance. They don't want to cooperate with you. They want to cause trouble. They want to cause stress and strain and heartache. Guess what? You end up with stronger muscles. Life is that way. Life can be so good, but at times it can be challenging. So whether it's the situation with Uncle Frank or whether it's the situation of being invited to go swimming and they actually weren't inviting you, or whether it's a situation that Zig had to go through to learn, if someone's trying to pay you for something and you're in sales, it might be a good idea to take the money. If you're dealing with something and you feel like you want to quit, but you just keep going. Welcome to life. I want to be the one to be an encourager to you today. To let you know my motto, I'm wearing it on my arm right this minute. It's a band that says, I learned this from my mentor many, many years ago. It says, just do the next right thing. That's my motto for life. That's the way to connect with people and let life produce a great experience for you. You don't know what to do. Just do the next right thing. When things go great, just do the next right thing. When things go bad, just do the next right thing. You will be the winner for it. Life does not have to beat you up. Life can be an experience to bring you along, to help you to become the person you were meant to be. I'm Dr. Robert Rome. I hope these thoughts today have been helpful to encourage you. If you mess up, don't give up. Clean it up and just do the next right thing. You'll be glad you did. I look forward to talking to you on our next podcast. Thank you. So much.

For more information about this podcast, please visit www.becomingwiserpodcast.com.