I envy those rare souls who seem to understand the meaning of their actions as they do them. As for me, I learn only after my mistakes have repeated themselves.
I do not say this proudly, but I have noticed that I am slower in my lessons than I would like. Wisdom seems to prefer to creep up behind me, pull my ear, and only then reveal its grin.
When something goes well, I hardly pause to inquire why. Success is treated like a favorable wind: I enjoy the ride, and only afterward wonder what direction it carried me. But when I blunder, the memory lingers. It insists I look at it again, and again, until the shame turns to instruction.
We complain that understanding comes late, as though wisdom owed us punctuality. Yet would we listen to it if it arrived early? I think that, like medicine, it must sting before we believe it works.