Small consequences are cheap lessons. Learn from them before the expensive ones show up.

Lessons have different prices. A late assignment, a missed bus, a small fine: each teaches roughly what a serious version would teach, for almost nothing. The temptation is to explain the cheap ones away, since they barely hurt, and that is precisely how the expensive version eventually arrives. A cheap lesson only works if you actually take it.

Think of the last small thing that went wrong and name the one change that would have prevented it. Make that change now, while the stakes are still trivial. When something minor stings, treat the sting as information rather than something to get past quickly.