The thing to do, when we have made a mistake, is not to give up doing what we were doing and start something altogether new, but to start over again and try to do it well.

"It is not complicated to lead the spiritual life.  But it is difficult.  We are blind and subject to a thousand illusions.  We must expect to be making mistakes all the time.  We must be content to fail repeatedly and to begin again to try to deny ourselves for the love of God.

It is when we are angry at our own mistakes that we tend most of all to deny ourselves for love of ourselves [i.e., our ego-self].  We want to shake off the hateful thing that has humbled us.  In our rush to escape the humiliation of our mistakes, we run headfirst into the opposite error, seeking compensation.  And so we spend our lives running back and forth from one attachment to another . . .

The thing to do, when you have made a mistake, is not to give up doing what you were doing and start something altogether new, but to start over again with the thing you began badly and try, for the love of God, to do it well."

Thomas Merton, 1949

Photo: New growth springs from the base of a burned stalk; High Park Burn, Rist Canyon, CO; July 2, 2012.  I took this photo on the very first day that the Larimer County Sheriff's Department allowed us to go back up the canyon.

I've often experienced first-hand what Merton is talking about here.  For me, the "opposite error" Merton speaks of is the tendency to beat myself up for having the behavior or issue that I'm fighting.   Liberation comes when I realize that the attitude of guilt is just as constrictive - and therefore as ego-based - as the behavior I'm fighting!