New moon on the 13 May 2021 in Dagotiere, Mauritius
Why are we so hard on ourselves to be perfect?
Let’s look around us. Does every leaf have perfect symmetry? Are all the leaves the same shade or the same shape? Is every rose petal perfect?
Let’s look at the people around us. Are your parents perfect? Is your partner perfect? Is your pet perfect?
The answer to all of these are no (at least, for me). We still appreciate and love nature and the people around us through their imperfection. Why can’t we appreciate our own beauty (inside and out)?
Where does this need to be perfect come from, while the whole Universe shows us love through the imperfection of nature? Think of the yellowing leaves, the flowers that are all different from one other or the vegetables with weird shapes. We’ve reached a place where we even reject the ugly fruits and vegetables, even if these will provide us with the same amount of nutrients as the pretty ones. We look for perfection.
But what is perfection? How can you use this need to be perfect in your growth journey and find a balance for that need?
First, it is good to put it out there that no one is perfect and we all mess up sometimes.
We all make mistakes. We must learn to rewire our brain to look at mistakes as a guide. A guide that will help us excel in whatever we are doing. Just like the baby learning how to walk, he/she gets back up after the fall. They don’t give up, they try again.
The imperfections we see are here to teach us how to improve and how to find solutions, to try again the next time. When you get a bad grade, you think about all the mistakes you made leading to that bad grade. The late nights, the distractions or the fatigue; whatever it is, you find a solution so that next time you are better prepared.
This is how we should view our imperfections. It is an opportunity to be solution-driven, to think about what we can do to improve on the issue, instead of self-doubt or being hard on ourselves for messing up.
So, how to use your perfectionist reflex:
1. Remember you are human, you allowed to make mistakes
2. Ask yourself what went wrong and how would your future-self improve on this issue
3. Ask yourself how you want to implement on those solutions
4. Change the definition of perfectionist in your mind. Perfection is all about how to get better for tomorrow, not about always being perfect.
You did what you knew to be the best.
You are doing the best you can with the resources, knowledge and wisdom you have right now.
You will do better tomorrow. You are a work in progress, your value just keeps getting higher and higher. You are exactly where you need to be.
You are imperfectly perfect, you are enough.
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