It’s the second day of my mental health week with reflections,  tips, and lessons of my own on mental health. Here’s today’s reflection that I subscribe to very strongly.

Day 2: It’s okay to make mistakes. I choose to look at mistakes as lessons, opportunities to learn, and a necessary part of my life’s journey. We exist and therefore we aren’t perfect. We aren’t perfect and therefore we make mistakes. It’s exam and final paper time at UBC and so fear of making mistakes – forgetting what you’ve studied, missing steps in an equation, incorrectly citing a source in a research paper – is pretty high. If you find your stress soaring or your anxiety increasing as you fixate on these thoughts, write my mantra down and repeat it to yourself as often as you need (or another positive, self-affirming thought of your own). Stuff it in your pocket, write it on your arm, put it into your phone. Just think, in about two weeks, it’ll all be over and you can exhale deeply and fully.

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