"Being Wrong," the first book by Kathryn Schulz '96, challenges its readers to truly examine the idea of being wrong in action or belief instead of simply treating it instinctively as negative and damaging to character.
Published this past June, the book explores the nature and cultural conception of error. It also raises important, fascinating questions about the benefits accrued from making mistakes and how they affect our relationships with people and our knowledge about ourselves.
Schulz said she explored the "weird" way our culture "thinks about the idea of error" and "how individuals think about experiences as being wrong." The book also offers error's intellectual history, philosophy and psychology, exploring how error has been viewed throughout time by thinkers like Freud and Descartes.
Schulz added that she wants readers to learn and understand the value of taking a step back and questioning whether we might be wrong in believing or doing the things we so firmly believe to be right.
"There are lots of complexities and nuances in our lives," Schulz said. "It's easy to detect the psychological phenomenon in other people … but we are very bad in detecting it in ourselves. We are attached to the sense of being right."
The idea for the book, meant to provoke self-reflection and reevaluation, first took seed in 2004 — not from a life-altering personal story, but rather from a culmination of carefully observed experiences over a period of time.
For example, Schulz was struck by how divisive Americans were as they debated political issues with the goal of definitively proving their opponents wrong.
"We are right and everyone else is wrong. There is no possibility to step back to think about your own beliefs," Schulz said, explaining the sort of view she explores in her book.
On an assignment for the New York Times to interview a group of conservatives in Dallas, Schulz experienced the conscious acknowledgment of the possibility that she might have to reevaluate her beliefs.
She described herself as these people's "enemy" because she not only worked for the media, the liberal New York Times, but also came from an ultra-liberal educational background. "It was striking to be in that position. God, I wished the people would shut up for a minute," Schulz remembered. "But then I asked: Am I capable of shutting up? Can I think about their political views?"
Schulz is a freelance journalist who has written for the New York Times, the Boston Globe and Foreign Policy, among many other newspapers, and a regular contributor to the blog on Slate Magazine, which gives her an opportunity to discuss making mistakes with celebrities.
With all her experience, it would be easy to assume that writing the book came easily to her. But "writing is hard," she said firmly. "The most challenging aspect was how to organize it."
"The best part was going out and getting materials," she said, "and spending a year talking to people."
Always interested in language and ideas, Schulz said writing a book pushed her to enhance her skills as a reporter and her ability to get people to tell their stories.
In the end, Schutz said, she feels "very happy and fortunate to say that I really love this book. It's a hard enough process … I felt really blessed and honored."
Schulz described her experience at Brown, where she concentrated in history, as "highly influential" in motivating the kind of writer and individual she is today. "In the most basic and fundamental level, Brown makes me feel like someone who has the right to make intellectual contributions," Schulz said. "I have the right to have my own thoughts." This intellectual freedom allowed her to "step back and look at the world," an opportunity for open-mindedness which she capitalizes on in her book.
Schulz said students in high school — worried about perfect SAT scores and entering the best college — often create a checklist of things to do and want to know precisely "what decision leads to (what) outcome."
College is the last phase of life when this attitude works, said Schulz, referring to the "messiness after college." Career paths change constantly, and "this new environment has no checklist," she said.
While there is nothing wrong with being a perfectionist — Schulz admitted that she is one — the expectation of total success "is really, really hard to deal with," she said. "The important thing is to accept that something's going to happen to you."
