Demystifying Carelessness

What is carelessness?

It is something that makes those guilty of it occasionally indignant, at times helpless, and almost always frustrating. Unlike forgetfulness, carelessness can occur even when one has remembered what needs to be done, and the person may not even realise the mistake until it is too late - it just does not come to mind. Carelessness can also be a lack of situational awareness, ending up doing things that can annoy or even put off people.

Carelessness manifests itself in many aspects of life. For students, one wrong operation sign can cost them dearly in Mathematics. For parents, one moment of neglect, and their infant child can be at risk of drowning when they naughtily venture into deep water. In relationships, a few hurtful words hollered angrily can leave deep scars to those at the receiving end of them. In our daily lives, carelessness can also come in the form of leaving important things (like documents) at home. 

I have been trying to grapple with this problem for many years. It has been so bad that I have developed a fear of forgetting things, and will check multiple times just to ensure that I do bring the necessary things. Most worrying of all, I am scared that I will be overwhelmed in my noisy mind, unable to sort out what needs to be done and missing out important things.

Argh! I remembered leaving it somewhere there but why is it not there?!

Source: https://pics.me.me/huh-2-i-couldve-sworn-i-left-it-somewhere-around-26099056.png from Google Images

Why does this problem occur? What can be done?

After reflecting upon my experience with what people call as "carelessness" (it is really general and encompasses a lot of mistakes that is done in real life, such as for myself holding a chopstick by the wrong side), I have observed a few trends.

1. Before a careless mistake, what I usually do is to be in a hurry and complete the task, as such, I have not considered the consequences of my actions. Hence, when any problem comes out of my action, I will not have seen it coming. I have tried to solve this by reflecting on my actions, and try to record my thoughts in an online journal. I have also tried to go through my mind first before acting of things. In general, when I stay calm and is actively engaging any activity with my brain, I find that I can focus more easily and be less careless. My carelessness may also have a relation to my emotions. When I feel irritated, I am already struggling to take care of myself, much less worry about other things. I have learned to manage it by recording what I feel and do some meditation to be less triggered.

2. This applies mostly for academic work but I miss out checking my work another time. I somehow think it does not make sense to read the same thing more than once (most likely because checking my wordings become less important in this social media era when others can already overlook these mistakes and understand what I am trying to say). I can learn something from why people check their phones excessively - coming up with notifications and reminders from a schedule to check whatever I have worked on so far. And, if possible, asking others to help me to look through. To achieve that, it will require a bit of discipline and determination.

3. Many of the times I neglect to do things because I forget about them cleanly. I found that adding visual cues can help. For example, to help me remember where I am charging my phone, I place my water bottle - an object that is important for my hydration, health and well being, beside my phone. This allows me to remember things more easily. It has also been proven by research that adding more cues help us to remember things better, which may sound surprising when the knee-jerk reaction to these cues is the dread of more things to remember, but it works because there is a higher chance for us to find one of the related cue and connect back to what we are trying to recall. Phone reminders and notifications work this way too.

4. Another important reason is because I lack the habit of recording things systematically. Usually during a class I can make notes on whatever worksheet I am holding on to, only to forget whatever I wanted to do with it when I return home from school. I also rely heavily on online-based productivity apps such as Google Calendar but it may not be convenient for me to refer to these apps or systems wherever I go. I may make a mental note but realistically, our brains are pretty bad at multitasking, so whatever I remembered may get lost when I am involved in other tasks. I think it will be better to complement it with a hard-copy notebook to capture whatever I need to remember, and then organise them when I transfer them to my online systems. It will also be good if I can have a separate file for keeping those things I need to complete, so it is easier to figure out what I need to do. Having supportive peers are important too as my friends and I can remind one another on what needs to be done.

Carelessness is not easy to address at all. Unless there has been actions to engage with the root cause(s) and something is done at the individual or community level, the same careless mistakes can repeat again. So (personal take) it is important to take action before it gets worse.