Mistakes. We all make them. Sometimes they are simple and silly, like when we somehow forget our PIN at the checkout counter or wave at a person waving at us…only to realize that they are actually waving at someone else. (It’s awful!) Sometimes they are more serious, like when we flunk an important test or do something we know we shouldn’t do.
Yes, mistakes are inevitable. That’s why, most of the time, it’s not the mistake that really matters. It’s what we doafterthat counts.
Recently, I came across a story that illustrates this truth. I found it to be so positive and wholesome that I wanted to share it with you.
In the spring of 2003, just before an NBA basketball game between the Portland Trail Blazers and the Dallas Mavericks, a young singer named Natalie Gilbert took the court to perform the national anthem. She had a great voice, she had just won a singing competition, and she was excited to make her professional debut on such a large stage.
She was also only thirteen years old.
There were 20,000 fans in the arena that night, and because it was a playoff game, a national television audience. All watched expectantly as Natalie walked onto the court, took the microphone, and sang:
Oh, say can you see,
by the dawn’s early light,
What so proudly we hailed,
at the starlight’s…star…
Natalie faltered. She had accidently substituted the word “starlight” for “twilight.” Realizing her mistake, she hesitated…and then completely forgot the next words! It was a heart-stopping moment. The kind of moment we all dread whenever we speak or perform in public. A run-and-hide kind of moment. A “standing naked in front of your classmates without clothes” kind of moment. A “wish I’d never been born” kind of moment.
For three agonizing seconds, there was silence. Then, something happened. The audience began to cheer. The Portland coach was walking onto the court.
His name was Maurice Cheeks, and as an NBA legend, he knew something about performing under pressure. He went up to Natalie and put his arm around her. “It’s alright,” he said enthusiastically. “Starlight’s last gleaming.” (He also forgot the correct word, but at that moment, nobody cared.)
As Natalie later recalled it: “That moment where I was standing there looking around, that felt like forever. But then…he was there. The second I turned over my shoulder, he was right there and he was like, ‘No, we’re gonna do this…you’re going to finish this song.’”
She repeated the words…and then, together, the two of them began to sing in unison. Natalie’s voice carried the tune, with Cheeks always there to help with a word whenever she needed it.
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming.
As Natalie regained her confidence, Cheeks gestured to the crowd. The entire arena joined in to sing.
And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
It was an early “viral” moment in the history of the internet — the coach helping this young girl overcome her stage fright and fix her mistake. But though she received a standing ovation, and was even invited to a few talk shows, it was still hard to overcome the mortification she felt. At school, other kids would tease her or whisper behind their hands as she passed by.
Dr. Seuss once said, “When something bad happens, you have three choices: You can let it define you, let it destroy you, or you can let it strengthen you.” Natalie chose the third path. She decided to keep singing. She took voice lessons and went on to sing professionally in theater and at events. Rather than be destroyed by the embarrassment or let the mistake define her, she chose to bestrengthenedby it instead. Strengthened by a kindly stranger who took the time to say, “It’s alright.” Strengthened by the fact that, despite everything,she finished the song.
Fast forward to March 2025. Twenty-two years later, now a grown woman with children of her own, Natalie received a new invitation. An invitation to sing the national anthem. At a basketball game. For the Portland Trail Blazers. There was no way she could say no.
“It’s the best example I can show my children,” Natalie said “That, hey, it’s okay to make mistakes. It’s all about how you recover from them.”
That’s an amazing perspective, isn’t it? We all make mistakes. They’re inevitable. What’s not inevitable is how we respond to them.
Natalie’s response was pitch perfect. This time, she didn’t need Cheeks’ help. But he was in the crowd, watching and smiling, as she sang the anthem. Note for note. Word for word.
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free
And the home of the brave.
We all have a song to sing in this world. Sometimes we’ll forget the words. Sometimes we’ll be off key. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that we help others when they falter; when they feel, like Natalie did, “helpless and hopeless.”
What matters is that, even if we make a mistake, we always keep singing.