Micro Misconcepts

A weekly upgrade for your misconcepts in under 5 minutes.

Fall In Love With Good Iterations

6th February 2026 | misconcepts.org​

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What if the fear of making mistakes is the actual mistake?

For years, I tried to avoid mistakes by over-analysing all my decisions and perpetually planning.

I thought I was being careful, but all that caution didn’t make me better. It just made me slower, more anxious, and trapped in a prison of my own making.

The breakthrough came when I realized mistakes aren’t the problem. They are the solution.

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Here’s the thing: mistakes are inevitable because you don’t know what you don’t know.

We all operate in the world using our misconcepts - mental models of the world that are inherently fallible and incomplete. If our understanding of the world is always a work in progress, then a "mistake" is simply necessary information. It reveals exactly where our model needs error-correction.

Once I saw mistakes this way, everything changed.

The question was no longer “How do I avoid mistakes?”

It became “How do I iterate faster?”

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Think of iteration as a learning loop:

1. Decision: Made based on your current misconcepts
2. Action: Decisions implemented in the world
3. Feedback: Real-world results of the action
4. Update: Use the feedback for error-correction
5. Repeat: Make a better decision using your updated misconcepts

The faster you cycle through this, the faster you improve.

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I used to think I needed to be right. Now, I just want to get better because I know I can’t always be right.

The fear of making mistakes keeps you stuck.

But iterations? They compound. Every cycle makes you a bit sharper, a bit wiser, a bit freer.

I’m still practicing this, and honestly, some days it’s still hard to fail. But I’m falling in love with good iterations because it’s the only way forward.

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Making the Change

Here's my question for you: Where are you currently stuck because you’re afraid to be wrong? What would just one iteration look like?

Start there. Try. Fail. Learn. Iterate.

See you next week,

Syn Yun

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P.S. If you know someone who is currently over-analyzing a decision, please consider forwarding this to them. We could all use a little more permission to iterate instead of being perfect.

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