Maybe I Am Wrong

Lately I realize — sometimes, what I was sure was the right thing in the past could turn into a wrong thing in the present.

Those thoughts came up when I rethought an event in the past where I was pretty sure someone did me wrong and caused me some emotional damage — and then — I questioned the premise.

Am I really not involved in this at all?

Then the idea came. Okay, they did me wrong — that's a fact, at least from my perspective. But the emotional damage is a thing that only I can create or delete. So if the emotional damage is bothering me, then it's not only their fault. I am also the one who caused it, and I am responsible for it.

So yeah, back to the core idea. I was sure the fault was all theirs. I was wrong — not about what they did, but about how much of it was mine to carry. Something I was that sure about still turned out wrong.

And another case is when a bug was introduced on the system I maintain. When I was writing it, I was pretty sure things worked and were right. But what I was sure about was only right inside the context where I tested it, not across the whole system. The "right" that came from my judgment turned into "wrong" the moment the context changed — the input data was invalid, and in my tests I had only ever assumed the data would be valid.

So based on these cases, I learned that I shouldn't be too sure I am right about something. What I call right is only right for the context and the knowledge I had at the time — and all of that moves.

And for the record — later on I might be saying this note is one of those things I thought was right but wasn't.