misstep

plural missteps · alternative mis-step

1. A step that is wrong, a false step.

   On a high ledge, a misstep could be fatal.

   1 more example

   […] burdened as he was, he did not think of length or height or toil. He remembered only to avoid a misstep and to keep his direction.

   1912 January, Zane Grey, chapter 8, in Riders of the Purple Sage […], New York, N.Y.; London: Harper & Brothers Publishers, →OCLC

2. figurativelyAn error or mistake.

   His comment was a misstep that could cost him dearly.

   1 more example

   Plenty of past seasons’ events could look ill-conceived in the critical eye of Monday-morning quarterbacking, but previously, the show had earned the benefit of the doubt that missteps on the part of supposedly intelligent characters were a plausible lack of in-world foresight.

   2019 May 19, Alex McLevy, “The final Game Of Thrones brings a pensive but simple meditation about stories (newbies)”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 22 May 2019

   Synonyms: error, faux pas, mistake

present singular third person missteps · participle present misstepping · participle past misstepped · past misstepped · alternative mis-step

1. intransitiveTo step badly or incorrectly.

   My dance partner misstepped and landed on my toe.

   1 more example

   Eckhart also speaks of this happening to a man who has misstepped (vertreten, as I recall); God, then, corrects the mis-swing of the man and brings him back to the Tao or Logos.

   2012, Philip K Dick, Jonathan Lethem, Pamela Jackson, The Exegesis of Philip K Dick

2. intransitiveTo make an error or mistake.

   I don't want to misstep by offending them.