Stop Should-ing on Yourself

A practice to help you hold yourself accountable when you make a mistake.

Whether it be in the workplace or your personal life, nobody is perfect when it comes to accountability.

This post is going to focus on how to manage your feelings and hold yourself accountable when you make a mistake. 

In this case, accountability refers to accepting responsibility. In times where it might be difficult to hold yourself accountable, it is extremely important to practice positive habits that help you manage your expectations and the way you view your own accountability.

Although we'd like to avoid it, every so often you miss a deadline, you’re late to a meeting, or you make a simple mistake. 

The important part about making mistakes is how you recover from them. 

If you take more time and energy beating yourself up over a mistake and not moving forward, you are spending more time ruminating on the problem than finding a solution, which is not beneficial on an emotional or professional level. 

More often than not, I catch myself and others saying “I should have done this” or  “I should be doing that.” This kind of thought process is toxic to properly recovering from mistakes because it leaves us believing there was another option. 

Yes, we need to recognize that we made a mistake, but phrase it in an actionable way, not a hypothetical.

Let’s Practice: 

Instead of saying: “I should have started my project earlier.” 

Say: “Next time, I will start my project earlier.”   

Instead of saying: “I shouldn’t have snoozed my alarm.”

Say: “Tomorrow, I will make sure to get up by my first alarm.”

Instead of saying: “I shouldn’t have eaten that brownie. Now, I feel gross.”

Say: “Damn that brownie was good, but I am going to go back to eating clean.”

It's simple changes like this that can help you hold yourself accountable for your mistakes and propel you to actively make the changes that you want to see in your life. 

Not every change has to be a big one, even the little ones are important. 

Next time you find yourself caught up in the should’s, remember: stop should-ing on yourself!