You Made a Mistake… Now What?

Episode 49 with Jill Griffin & Molly Bierman

In this episode of No Permission Necessary, Jill and Molly explore the mistakes that shape us, from personal and professional missteps to parenting, relationships, recovery, and leadership.

They discuss why mistakes can feel so tied to shame, especially for women who have been taught to hold themselves to unrealistic standards. The conversation highlights the difference between making a mistake and repeating a pattern, and why accountability is often what helps people grow instead of staying stuck.

This episode is a reminder that mistakes do not define who you are. What matters most is what you do next.

• TRANSCRIPTION

  Molly Bierman (00:00)

  Welcome back. We're surviving the week and I actually had I had a ⁓ Fellow listener colleague friend text me this morning and say she had just listened to the episode where we talked about, you know managing the load and

  Jill Griffin (00:03)

  thriving. I am thriving.

  you

  Molly Bierman (00:18)

  that she had a blood work slip that was sitting on the front passenger seat of her car for the last two weeks. And I will tell you that in addition to that, I still had not made the appointment, even though I even talked about it on the podcast. So her then texting me about it prompted me to then make the appointment. So see this? We're all just working together as a team out here.

  Jill Griffin (00:38)

  We're just really holding each other accountable to all the minutiae details.

  Molly Bierman (00:41)

  Yeah.

  Shout out to Missy.

  Jill Griffin (00:44)

  I'm still waiting

  Molly Bierman (01:04)

  So today we're going to be talking about mistakes, the personal ones, the professional ones, the parenting ones, and the relationship ones. And more importantly, what they actually taught us. Honestly, some of the biggest shifts in our lives did not come from success. They came from being humbled, humbling ourselves, and just voicing that our ability to maintain perfection is just unrealistic.

  So.

  Jill Griffin (01:32)

  This comes as such a good time for me because I will tell you some of the hard wiring that we get around mistakes and failures and how we adapt to that come from how we perceived our parents holding us accountable when we made mistakes as children and what that looked like growing up. And, you know, over the past couple of months, my daughter plays softball and she's a pitcher and you're on the mound.

  watching you, if you make a mistake, you are front and center, right? And she has this pitching coach that she went to this week. And she went from one game at the beginning of the week where she struck out six batters and two innings, like it was up and down. I mean, she did fantastic, right? You feel great. You have these strikeouts, you're crushing it. To the next day playing and really struggled.

  She gave up a lot of runs. She walked in a lot of batters and she came off the mound crying and she, you know, it doesn't feel good, right? And so I relay this to the pitching coach and I'm there and the pitching coach said to her, listen, as girls, we are taught that when you make a mistake, you're supposed to feel shame. And what we need to do instead.

  is to stand up when we make that mistake and say, yeah, I did that. Is there anybody else here trying? No, no one else is trying. So I'm out here failing, and I'm making mistakes, and that's OK. And so she also said this message around feeling in your body what it feels like when you don't do it the right way. Because pitching is a very physical example of doing something mechanically right and mechanically wrong.

  Molly Bierman (03:01)

  Mm-hmm.

  Jill Griffin (03:15)

  Something I feel like clicked for my daughter in this message because she was like, listen, the next time you throw that ball over the backstop or over the umpire's head or whatever, you're going to stand up tall and you're going to say, yeah, I did that. Yeah, I did that. Now I'm going to do it the right way because now I know that's not how I want to do it again. And like, just building this confidence in what it feels like to make a mistake and be OK with it.

  Molly Bierman (03:39)

  think that when, you know, I'm thinking about the messaging that I was raised with or the messaging that I digested. And I'm not sure that I felt like making a mistake was wrong. I think where I really struggled in terms of making a mistake was exploration, obviously, with substances. And that was always...

  you just don't do it. So then once I did it, I was, well, now I've done it, so I can't talk about it because there was an expectation to not do it. So I think that's probably where I hear the most talk, especially around parents in recovery, talking about women in recovery. How do you invite those mistakes to the table and how are you going to do it maybe differently? Again, I'm not saying the outcome would have been any different.

  for me, right? But what I do know is that as soon as I maybe crossed a line and wanted to share or wanted to go back, there was always this level of, well, this is what happened. I can't talk about it. And so there was this vault and protection around it.

  Jill Griffin (04:42)

  I have.

  I have a little bit of a different experience. think my perfectionism, which I think is toned down, I don't identify as a perfectionist. I feel like I dropped that a while ago. But I think it comes from this chameleon part that I played where I was a straight A honor roll student. And so if I upheld that part of my life, then I can go...

  and smoke crack and shoot heroin and keep this like double life up. And I did that successfully for a little while until the wheels came off, right? And so for me making a mistake looked like getting caught in a lie, failing a class, like, you know, getting into a car accident. And I really, I think I eventually stopped caring about it when my disease really took over. But I think I built that because I started using so young. Like, I feel like that double life is where the perfectionism was built.

  Molly Bierman (05:35)

  Mm-hmm.

  Jill Griffin (05:38)

  like trying to control that and not showing that I make mistakes.

  Molly Bierman (05:43)

  Do you think that you were someone that feared making a mistake ever in your life?

  Jill Griffin (05:46)

  No, I don't think However, I will say that parenting style is the part of a person developing a perfectionist mindset. And the reason I say that is I do a lot of work with individuals in the therapy room whose parents just had unrealistic expectations on them.

  Molly Bierman (05:47)

  Me neither.

  Jill Griffin (06:09)

  and the unrealistic expectations. It's like you get this goal or you do this thing, but it's never good enough. I see it in kids' sports all the time. There are certain parents on the sidelines. I'm like, man, the kids doing the best they can out here. And you're just like yelling, criticizing them in front of everybody on the sideline. I mean, this is not going to go well. This is breeding anxiety.

  This is an unrealistic expectation. These kids are young. They're not going to play their best every day. That's not the message. And so I think that type of parents also, think, children get the message from parents beating themselves up when they make mistakes. I mean, we send messages without sending messages, too.

  Molly Bierman (06:51)

  Well, I think when you talk in terms of mistakes, obviously have had their severity at different levels and different stages of our life. So when you think about whether mistakes have felt heavier now, right? We're in a place where we're managing other people, we're parents, we're friends, we're, you know.

  well adjusted children to our parents. Do you think that mistakes feel heavier when you're responsible for other people or do you feel like they were heavier when you were younger before you kind of got into all the trouble?

  Jill Griffin (07:23)

  I feel they're heavier now. And it's not that I don't have an expectation. I can tell you about a recent mistake that I made business-wise that I feel like I had the biggest reaction to is that I didn't realize that I had to re-enroll my company in some insurance thing. So there was a financial consequence, right, where I was unable to build a certain insurance for, let's say, seven weeks.

  Molly Bierman (07:25)

  Yeah.

  consequence. Sure.

  Jill Griffin (07:50)

  Okay, and so I had to own that to the team about, this is where we're at, this, and now I have to do all this extra work. And I feel like there was a part of me that instantly went into this, oh my god, do you even know what you're doing? Kind of questioning my confidence, because I'm like, how do I even let this happen? I do feel like I'm able to swing pretty quickly into, it is what it is. And I...

  I will say though that there were a couple people that I talked to during this process and I'm like, you're not somebody I can go to in a crisis. I've learned that through this mistake because a couple of the people that I talked to went down this, I could never tolerate that, I couldn't meet payroll. Okay, well, what do want me to do? I'm doing everything I can do about it. It is what it is. It sucks, but you're getting me more riled up versus calming me down. So this is not helpful.

  Molly Bierman (08:25)

  Interesting.

  Well,

  I think that's also, you know, really important to mention. So I know from my own experience when I have made a mistake or I have felt like I need to apologize for something or make amends for something.

  It is challenging, okay? I'm just gonna put that out there. And I don't know if that plays on perfectionism, I don't know if it plays on just admitting defeat, I think that's probably a big piece of it. Ego, pride, all of those things. So when I'm in the really kind of wrestling with the mistake, I do find it easier to acknowledge that when I'm...

  Jill Griffin (09:08)

  Ego.

  Molly Bierman (09:20)

  taking up space with somebody else, right? I'll give you an example. We were at dinner a couple of weeks I had a dinner with some colleagues and I could tell that I was starting to be a little too loose-lipped. There comes a point in the night that I need to go to bed.

  Okay? And that I should not be staying up past, we'll say, 9.30 is generous, okay? Or I should not be around people at 9.30 p.m. and beyond, outside of my close friends. And so I ended engaging in a bit of gossip. That to me is a mistake because number one, I don't think it's it's healthy or a kind gesture. And number two,

  Jill Griffin (09:44)

  Generous.

  Molly Bierman (10:01)

  once you open your mouth, you cannot put it back in. So in that moment, I really had to address, well, how did that show? Why did that show up? Was there some sort of people pleasing, fear of not fitting in, all of the things that pop up for people when we do make mistakes? Because mistakes could be just a genuine mistake, right? I broke a glass, OK? That's a basic mistake. Or it could be,

  I am out of alignment with how I want to operate as a human being and I made a mistake doing X action. And so me, it's really about accountability with people that I can say, hey, I was doing this and them not necessarily shame me about it, but just really kind of loop me back in and bring me back to reality is like, yeah, you did it. Can't take it back. And how do you want to do things moving forward?

  Jill Griffin (10:50)

  I do think that's a distinction that we need to make though because I was talking with somebody, I'm not going to get into the specifics about it, but basically there's some people in the spotlight right now, celebrities in the sports world around a cheating scandal, an affair, all of that somebody was like, yeah, it seems like a big mistake. To me, if you did something, the same action,

  with over and over and over again, that's no longer a mistake, that's a pattern of behavior. Because what you're talking about is, I did this thing that I felt in my body and I felt I had like immediate remorse and guilt around. Like I have, and I think our gut is really tuned in to when we do something we don't like because we're sober, we do the work. So when I feel that...

  Molly Bierman (11:36)

  Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

  Jill Griffin (11:41)

  and I override it and say, ⁓ it's all right, and I don't talk to somebody about it. I don't say it out loud. It goes from a mistake to a pattern of behavior that then becomes shame-filled because that's not a mistake anymore. You're making a choice to not correct it.

  Molly Bierman (11:57)

  No, mistakes are

  mistakes are sending a rogue text message. You should just think about it in the shower and fantasize about sending it, but don't send. Making a mistake.

  Jill Griffin (12:08)

  Or notes app,

  put it in the notes app like you're sending a text but you're not. Yeah, I mean.

  Molly Bierman (12:10)

  Right, burn it, do a burning ceremony. We could do a burning ceremony.

  ⁓ cut to Taylor. Maybe just give a little bit of a little clip of our burning ceremony that Jill and I did over the winter.

  ⁓ Saying yes when exhausted, doing things that you're over committed on. Those are mistakes, right?

  Staying in a situation too long is also a mistake. Finding your selfish behavior in doing something that you should have exited a long time ago.

  Jill Griffin (13:18)

  Yes.

  running over a garbage bag in the darkness of the night with your new car. It's a mistake.

  Molly Bierman (13:31)

  Do know what I just thought of?

  I think I can even, this is a mistake, but it is a very shameful mistake. And there may be people that unfollow us. But I'm just gonna say it. I remember when I was using, I was like flying down Quinnipiac Ave, okay? And I hit a cat and I looked back, but I didn't stop.

  And it was a mistake, guys. I don't know, but I just felt so bad. I still think about it. It did hobble off to the side of the road. I did at least catch that in the rear view, but that was a mistake. was a very unkind mistake, ⁓ but I thought about that when you just talked about running over the garbage bag.

  Jill Griffin (13:55)

  What were you gonna do?

  But you know what? That's

  a good example of like, you probably didn't think about that again, because you overrode that with whatever you were going down Quinnipiac Ave to do. So you forgot about that cat by that evening, and that was out of sight, out of mind. So it's and again, it's so you probably drove like that again the next day. I mean,

  Molly Bierman (14:30)

  But I'm still thinking about it now. How many years later? Gosh.

  Here we are.

  Jill Griffin (14:34)

  Maybe you

  ought to, do you want to do some EMDR around it? We can, we can accommodate that.

  Molly Bierman (14:38)

  Should we do some

  tapping? So those are some ways, know, guys, in your personal life though too, that you can easily make a mistake by just not being attuned to what is, where is your bandwidth.

  Jill Griffin (14:51)

  Well, it

  and I think that a lot of people who had trauma, neglect or family dysfunction growing up, that dysfunction leads to a coping mechanism of control and perfectionism. Because if I can control everything and make everything look nice and everything, then like I feel safe and I won't people will like me. And so those are the those are the maladaptive belief systems that I

  start unwinding with people. Well, if I show up messy, if I show up, you know, not perfect, people aren't going to like me. I'm not safe anymore. And so it's unraveling some of these underlying subconscious belief systems of like, why do you need to look perfect? And I guess that's why I say I don't, I don't really identify with perfectionism, especially from, I mean, motherhood, just in general, I show up messy in every and not like

  But I'm just authentically me all the time. And some days I'm more put together than others. Some days I have it together more than others. Sometimes things look nice and polished. Other days it's like, this is as good as it's gonna get and everyone's just gonna accept that.

  Molly Bierman (16:00)

  In terms of mistakes and how we have gained our own resilience through that, what are some of the professional mistakes that you have made and that have changed how you lead?

  Jill Griffin (16:14)

  I was thinking about examples that I haven't shared on the podcast before, I think a big...

  One of the things I think about is early on during my master's program and everything, was like, you know, earlier in recovery. And I over identified with my recovery, with my sobriety. I really felt like that was what made me, it was going to make me a good therapist and clinician and

  in terms of how that evolved, I learned through mistakes that I made in the clinical space that if I focused on that only, I limited my toolbox. And then I really couldn't help clients that maybe they weren't even in a space to accept recovery, look at recovery, like that wasn't something they really wanted to see. And it made it about me, right? So I had to really look at the person in front of me and what they needed. That has allowed me in leadership to be able to show people that

  The reasons why we come into this work is important and it's something for us to know, but it's also not relevant in the clinical space with the client. It's like data for us to have and to show up in our work, but not personalize it to the client sitting in front of us. And has allowed me to supervise people. listen, we all have that authentic self that's really important to show up in the workspace with.

  Molly Bierman (17:33)

  I think that some of the ways that my professional mistakes made an impact in how I carry myself and how I interact with families and with referring partners.

  is that I just really found myself making myself small in some ways to try to fit into what felt like the expectation. And when I really was able to drill down, this is what is the authentic right version of myself to be able to serve clients and families. That's really when I started to have a different.

  a different perception, I think, because there is a lot of how are we going to fit in? Who's going to like us? What dinner are you invited to? Who are you spending your time with? And I think what happened to me is that I leaned on that for a long time to really be raised up, right? Because I didn't necessarily know what I was coming in doing when I started out professionally. I knew I had a passion, but I didn't necessarily have the entire skill set to back that up, right? But

  I also feel like looked at other people's mistakes of kind of this one way to help clients and families and really kind of gained that experience from watching it and realizing it was ineffective in some ways and saying, okay, I'm going to go expand my skill set to be able to walk other avenues. So I think in a lot of ways, it's not necessarily always the mistakes that we made. Of course, I've made plenty of mistakes, but a lot of times it's also observing some of the mistakes and realizing that we can change

  trajectory for what needs to happen for us and for our line of work. ⁓ And you know, I think that also came from me, know, making outward mistakes, but also ignoring my gut professionally. There were a few times where I really felt convicted that either the treatment program I was working for was not the right fit for a client or

  I had a gut feeling that someone who I was interacting with was not, didn't have the best interest for the client. And that is a real thing. That is a real thing in behavioral health. That's a real thing everywhere, right? There is a level of how do we ensure that we are holding a standard across the board and that has been a challenge in our space. So I have ignored my gut at some times because I didn't have the confidence to say, hey, I don't believe you're doing the right thing here.

  I don't believe that you have the best interest for this family. And so that took a little bit of time. Now I definitely would say I'm on the other side of that. very outspoken and very clear that if somebody were to say, I wanna work and collaborate with you, I would say wonderful. And just so you know, I will always do what's in the best interest of the client regardless of what you think about it.

  Jill Griffin (20:14)

  I mean, at the end of the day, the people growing the most are the people willing to admit when they got it wrong. And I think that makes you more likeable and more...

  authentic and trustworthy if you're admitting when you're wrong. If you're never wrong or always deflecting blame or there's no accountability, like, it's just, that's something I'm paying attention to.

  Let's just do rapid fire

  What is the funniest mistake?

  you can think of.

  Molly Bierman (20:43)

  the funniest mistake in my life.

  I have a good one. The funniest mistake, I don't know if it was funny at the time, but it was embarrassing. I was competing in dance throughout my younger years and there was this gold standard from my instructor that if anything goes wrong on stage, you keep dancing, okay? Anything.

  Jill Griffin (20:45)

  I don't know. Yeah. Yeah.

  Yeah, that's...

  the show must go on.

  Molly Bierman (21:09)

  That was the messaging,

  okay? Well, my top broke and I was in the front and it was one of those like triangle, does anyone remember like the almost bandana tops with the ties? So there was one tie in the back, one tie at the lower back and one tie up around the neck. And my dance instructor had told me explicitly, do not wear this out before you perform.

  Jill Griffin (21:20)

  Yeah.

  Molly Bierman (21:33)

  and all of us went to the club to the underage club. And I was like, well, I'm gonna wear I'm gonna wear the top to the club and then I'll wear it to, you know, for the dance and the final recital. Well, the top broke. I kept dancing for a little bit and then I had to get off because I was flashing what little I had to flash on stage. And I came back to him and I was like, you told me to keep dancing. He's like, yeah, but not if your top is off. What are we talking about here? So

  Jill Griffin (21:38)

  It is night.

  You're like, well.

  Molly Bierman (22:01)

  Twofold mistake. One, I stayed on stage for probably a little bit too long, and number one is is I shouldn't have worn the top, and I did anyway.

  Jill Griffin (22:08)

  Honestly, don't really know. I think in hindsight, the funniest mistake, just because from the pictures I see, is cutting my hair really short, probably around the age that my daughter is now. So around fifth grade, I got a short haircut, which I love a short cut. But when you're in fifth grade and you have curly hair, you don't know how to take care of it. So I just had a fro. The pictures are not good.

  Molly Bierman (22:28)

  It's not good.

  Jill Griffin (22:33)

  But now it's funny to look back at, but at the time, that was probably very character building for me to walk down those hallways day after day. We're just owning this. This was a mistake, clearly, but we are owning it. I think I started using shortly after that. Okay?

  Molly Bierman (22:46)

  Totally. Cut to a picture? Do we have a picture? A mistake you'd

  never take back.

  Jill Griffin (22:56)

  my honestly my whole active using career. mean, there is no part of anything that I did when I was using that I would take back because it shaped me into who I am today.

  Molly Bierman (22:59)

  I was just gonna say the same thing. Me too. Me too.

  Absolutely.

  Absolutely.

  Jill Griffin (23:13)

  one thing you are completely wrong about in your 20s.

  Molly Bierman (23:15)

  that I knew anything about love, dating, or relationships. Zero things.

  Jill Griffin (23:20)

  You

  I would say my skin care, I was completely wrong about what that should look like. ⁓ And I'm gonna honestly say, haven't improved much have not improved much now that I'm saying that. ⁓ A makeup wipe and let's keep it moving. mean, that's ⁓

  Molly Bierman (23:33)

  you're still not there.

  Yes. No, come on. Okay, we'll talk offline about that. ⁓ Best lesson I learned the hard

  way was that no one cares about your business as much as you care about your business. And in order to raise people up and feel convicted about a purpose, it takes a lot of work, a lot of authenticity, a lot of connection, and a lot of risk.

  Jill Griffin (24:03)

  would say the best lesson I learned the hard way is around friendships.

  I don't know, people will surprise you both ways. Like, both ways and I think the ultimate lesson learned is believe people when they show you who they are the first time.

  Molly Bierman (24:11)

  both ways. Showing up or showing out.

  Yes. If you're in a season where you feel like you've messed something up, you've done, you know, something that you feel like you can't stomach personally, professionally, or relationally, you're probably a lot less alone than you think. Mistakes don't define people. What they do next usually does. Stay tuned for our episodes that drop every Tuesday. Please give us a comment, a follow, a like and subscribe.

  On YouTube, Instagram, we have a new newsletter coming out. Drop us your email. Information is in the show notes. Until next time, have a good day.

  Jill Griffin (24:58)

  Peace.