MY LIFE AS A PERFECTIONIST

Someone once said, "perfectionism is another word for procrastination", and I couldn't agree more.

Do you have a thousand drafts that have not seen the light of day because none of them is "perfect", "good enough" or "complete"?
I know.
Because I totally get it.
If my notes app could complain, I'd be deaf by now.

You see, while perfectionism has its perks, it can be crippling, especially to young creatives who are still unsure of their footing and are trying to self navigate.
I’m talking from experience.

It comes with a barrage of negative emotions like self doubt, self sabotage, pessimism, lack of focus, fear of failure and the worst of all, procrastination.

You wake up everyday, hyper and driven with dreams, ideas and visions but by the end of the day, you're more unproductive than a caveman with a laptop.
Why?
Because you have thought up a trillion ways your idea could go wrong or is already wrong(most of which are just illusions in your head), you've torn apart that creative piece you wrote with your imagination and dissected them into reasons why "it's not yet time".

It's a burden we didn't give ourselves.
But it can be managed.

Perfectionism stems from the false idea that you have to be perfect. It's like a mental image of perfection that you have of yourself or others and when your creativity or theirs does not match that image, different limiting emotions come in and further tear down whatever positive thing that creative piece or idea had.
I'm talking fear, anger, self doubt, pessimism, procrastination, you name it.

But the entire concept of perfectionism is flawed because the idea of perfection is an illusion. A facade.
The more you chase it, the farther away from it you get.
You can be good, excellent, amazing, splendid and every good adjective you can think of—but not perfect.

The minute I recognized this, I was on my way to managing my perfectionism.

Another thing that is helping me with this is my acceptance of it.
Sounds ironic right?
I'll explain.

I have been able to admit to myself that perfectionism has actually benefited me in a lot of ways—the high standards I have in delivering my jobs, why I make such an amazing proofreader, my keen attention to detail, my organizational skills both professionally and at home(you won't believe my wardrobe hangers are arranged by color), the list goes on.

When you completely negate something, it becomes a bigger monster than it really is.
Admitting the positives as well as the negatives is a healthier way of managing it.

I still struggle with perfectionism on a daily.
You don't want to know how many times I edited this piece you're reading right now because "this paragraph didn't sound right" or "won't this be better here instead?"

But the growth here is that I'm not where I was a year ago or 6 months ago.
It's still there, and will probably be till the end of time, but the goal is to manage it such that it's no longer vicious in ways that threaten your sanity and growth.

I hope this helps.❤

Related posts:

Non saprei dire con esattezza se certi film ti restano in mente perché li vedi da adolescente e sei più impressionabile o perché hanno una qualità intrinseca che li rende pietre miliari. Di certo…

If you think you can start right away and get rich, you are very wrong. Let me inform you in advance; you will fail your business with a 99% chance. First of all, you will lose your motivation, and…