Various ways to react to a mistake

When a person makes a mistake it is fascinating to see how they respond. Based on the situation and nature of the person who makes the mistake there are various ways one can react. I tried to broadly divide the reactions into following 7 categories:

1. No I didn't make a mistake – I never do any! 
   This is the kind of response we give when we don’t want to agrees to the mistakes we do. Even the mistakes of worst nature i.e. blunders would not deter us from self-protection. This behaviour could be because the person really believes that it isn't their mistake or it could be that the person knows it but isn't brave enough to accept the mistake. The problem with this behaviour is that the person doesn't learn from the mistakes and keep making them again and again.  
2. It’s not my mistake, I did it because...
   Most of us use this in scenarios where we try to find excuses for our short comings. The hard core section of this group of people try to find a reason and believe that is unavoidable and not in one’s control. Sometimes the reasons are so bizarre that the believing in the reason itself becomes a mistake.This behaviour helps in reducing any sadness caused due to the mistake as finding the reason, however absurd the reason might be, gives the person a chance to be relieved of any guilt.
3. It’s others fault
   This kind of behaviour is almost similar to the one above but it is different in a way that the reason we find is always other people rather than things. At times the blame can be moved from one person to other based on who is readily available to blame on
4. Who are you to point out my mistakes!
   This is the reaction you get from people who are either arrogant or really crossed about their mistake. The only problem is that this leads to confrontation with the person who pointed out the mistake unless the other person is composed
5. Yeah I made a mistake so what?
   When the person “thinks” that the mistake is very small then one gives this response. But this thinking might irritate others who bear the brunt of the mistake. So it’s better to be humble to every mistake done and try to think from others perspective.
6. Oh sorry I made a mistake – will try not to repeat
   This is probably the ideal response. As some famous person said – one who doesn’t make any mistakes is not human – it is impossible to lead a life without mistakes so the best thing to do is to not repeat the same mistakes but try doing brand new ones. This is only possible if we learn from the mistakes we make
7. I made a mistake – I should make others life hell with my apologies

When people think that their mistake is so naïve and/or horrible they try to undo the mistake by apologising very hard. But this makes apologising itself a bigger mistake than the original one. Yes one should apologise to mistakes but should not go overboard. If the mistake is so bad that it caused irreversible damage then it is better to show that you are sorry in action rather than just by words which after some time becomes useless.

Though some of reactions are mistakes themselves every person must have used almost all the kinds of reactions in various situations. If making mistake is bad, not reacting appropriately is a blunder. As we keep growing up we need to learn how to not repeat a mistake and this learning starts from our response to mistakes.

Ideally we should all be humble to every mistake we make but as we are human it is not possible, so the best we can do is to learn from them and make learning a habit.