I'm struck by the number of people I meet who are running new businesses that seem to repeat the same mistakes. I'm certain this isn't because they want to; I also believe they have the ability not to.
"Always make new mistakes," is the signature on Esther Dyson's emails.
That's the idea.
I have a friend, Bill, who is 60. When he was 50, he decided to take up golf, never having played in his life.
He was terrible, and few people wanted to play with him. Today, he's the club champion with about a 3 handicap. That's a highly unusual outcome. What happened?
"Well," said 
Bill, "I realized golf takes a lot of time and I wasn't going to think of all that time as just recreation. I decided that every time I took a swing I would learn something. It took ten years, but now I know how to play and I avoid most of the common mistakes."
The conscious process of actively deciding to learn makes all of the difference. Others played right alongside Bill for all those games and they aren't any better. They also aren't more or less athletic, or enthusiastic.
They just don't have a focus on the activity at the moment, and an explicit expectation to learn from their experience.
And that's just golf.
Think how much more valuable this idea is if you apply it to anything that has some meaning, and not just a recreational exercise.
The entrepreneur has the opportunity to master the intricacies of his business process; his customer's minute but important expectations; venture financing; people management. The list goes on. He can integrate advice within the context of his learning experience and learn from that advice more quickly.
All of this is the gift of awareness.
Are you learning something today?