You know the phrase: “Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong.” It’s a catch-all for our frustrations in life. Most people focus on the "will go wrong" implying that we are helpless against it. Maybe we should reconsider the implications. What we believe to be true, consciously or unconsciously, can become what we live.

If we rephrase the tag-line to be "can go wrong", we can define our own destiny a bit more and gain some control over the chaos we call life. If you eliminate all the "can go wrongs", nothing "will go wrong." Easier said than done, right?

Actually eliminating ALL of the things that can go wrong in life probably isn’t practical, or even possible, but just like you might eat an elephant (one bite at a time!), you can reduce the daily disruptions one step at a time.

Chaos is a time waster. When things ‘go wrong’, they eat into your day and put you farther and farther behind your planned schedule. However, the power of this concept is, if you can get rid of a few of the biggest "can go wrongs", the chance of a serious "will go wrong" occurring is much smaller.

NASA takes this approach. They do it imperfectly (nobody does it perfectly), but much of the effort placed into traveling off this planet is expended asking that very basic question: “What could possibly go wrong?” Fortunately, the crew of Apollo 13 were the beneficiaries of such thinking. The design team was dedicated to anticipating what could go wrong, and figuring-out ways around it. The result: The failure of the mission was a complete success. Everybody came home alive.

We can use this approach for planning shows, and it can pay-off in both time and money. Cancelled shows and injured crew and/or performers can be expensive, both financially and in terms of human capital.

Planning ahead should be second-nature, however, playing a brief game of “What could possibly go wrong?” along the way can be a good exercise. Think of it as a prequel to a formal Risk Assessment. Or a Near Miss Analysis for something that never actually happened.

• See that cord flopped across the floor? What could possibly go wrong?
  
  
  
• Five minutes ‘til curtain and that lamp just burned-out on the mid-stage wash light? We’ll just run that man-lift out there without the outriggers . . . What could possibly go wrong?