The epiphany hit me when I finished Wednesday’s New York Times crossword puzzle.
Epiphanies are like that, showing up at odd times, all unexpected-like.
I finished the puzzle in about nine minutes, a third faster than average. I didn’t take pride in that fact, though, and felt no sense of achievement. Instead, I said to myself, “It’s only a Wednesday puzzle; they’re pretty easy.”
And it hit me.
I do this all the time. I never allow myself to enjoy my accomplishments. I’m never happy with what I’ve done. I do not view an achievement with pride; instead, I only see how far I was from the goal.
And it’s not like the goal is anything attainable — the goal is frakking perfection — so I’m like…doomed.
I’ve touched on this before, pondering strategies to deal with the tyranny of should, but while this line of thought is a logical outgrowth of that previous one, my earlier post dealt only with the symptom, not the cause. Perfectionism is the cause.
But perfectionism has also been a benefit to me, and therein lies my dilemma.
Downside: Perfectionism is why I downplay every achievement of my life. So, I’ve written nine novels? My friend Barb has dozens to her credit, and mine sell like shite. So, I held the seat as principal violist with the Philharmonic for a decade? Meh, it was a regional orchestra, not a fully professional one. So, I completed the New York Times crossword puzzle, without error, 33% faster than average? Dude, it’s only a Wednesday puzzle, and I was still a minute off my best time.
For each achievement, there’s a higher bar showing me how badly I failed. Perfectionism doesn’t see the garden; it sees the weeds. It doesn’t see the distance traveled, only the distance yet to go.
And it’s bloody exhausting.
Upside: My perfectionism has driven me to do better at…everything, to challenge myself. It drove me to be the best husband I can be, to think of others before myself, to write those nine novels, to vie for that principal seat. It was what goaded me into trying for (and being awarded) a scholarship at a music academy in Jerusalem, and it fueled my dreams of owning a home which took me from San Rafael to Seattle (where housing prices were, at the time, reasonable). My perfectionism has taken me places — physically, mentally, emotionally, financially — that I would never have seen without it.
So I can’t wish it had never been.
But I can decide that it’s time to put it aside. I can decide that it’s done its job, that it’s set me on a good and stable path, inspired me to achievements in which I can take pride, and instilled within me habits of self-improvement and discipline that will be quite useful in the coming decades.
I can decide to be happy with what I’ve accomplished. While that’s a sentiment that is a hell of a lot easier to type than to put into practice, the alternative is spending the rest of my life continually disappointed in myself, and that just seems stupid.
Frankly, I’m smarter than that.
So now begins a new period, a new outlook which, through practice, I believe will make me a happier, more serene person. It’s time to own my achievements just as I’ve always owned my mistakes.
I shall learn to revel in what I can do, rather than suffer because of what I cannot. I am not perfect, and I never shall be.
At least, now, I no longer want to be.
k
[…] readers know that I battle with perfectionism. It chides me for what I’m not doing, and berates me for what I have done. Perfectionism is both a goad and a hindrance, in equal measure, and […]
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Seasons greetings! I recommend that you allow a little child to decorate your Christmas tree crookedly but with joy. Keeping priorities and people in prominence, helps prevent perfectionism.
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I did a software project/ world building (NeverWinterNights) thing with an “Artiste”.
I had to publish the project without telling him. The publish date had been pushed back time and again because it wasn’t “done”.
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No one pays for perfection. No one is that dumb.
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Lots of food for thought here, Kurt! It reminded me of something my father told me years ago. An artist, he’d been working on a commissioned painting. It looked finished to me, but it sat in the studio room of our house, and a few times a day he’d stare at it, pick up a brush, make a little adjustment or enhancement. But the client wanted the painting. “At some point, Ellen,” he told me, “you have to decide it’s done. Otherwise you’ll keep working at it forever.” Sometimes I know I should have worked a little longer on a book before publishing, but he was right. It was time to decide it was done.
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The lesson I learned from my artist father was “A good artist knows when to stop.” Pretty much the same sentiment. Otherwise, we’d edit and re-edit and tweak forever. It’s a hard lesson to learn, but one I’m able to apply in SOME areas; definitely not all, though.
It’s like we should aim for the ideal perfection, but be satisfied with imperfection. Cognitive dissonance.
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I like what you say about perfectionism not making happy. Rather the opposite. It’s weird, isn’t it, that it’s still such strong a habit. It’s the idea we have about perfection that might be flawed. Thinking and reading a lot about that recently. Seems to be a bug… 🙂
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Lol!
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I used to struggle with perfectionism a lot. As for me, I have come to realise that it didn’t help me to focus on being less perfectionist (it just made me more critical of myself). A shift occurred when, for the first time, I actually asked myself WHY I was being perfectionist, what purpose it served, what need it fulfilled. What was I afraid of would happen if I was not? The answer might be different for everybody. What I do know is that once I accepted that it was a roundabout and somewhat dysfunctional way of fulfilling a certain need and I started addressing that need differently, more appropriately and more caringly (for myself) the urge to be perfect subsided. It’s weird, I never thought that would happen but it did and it’s truly relieving and liberating.
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I’m having much the same conversation with myself. I’m not interested in setting blame (in itself a sign of growth on my part) but in understanding why I have the drive for perfection in the first place, and what I gain from it. For me, the kicker was realizing that, should I ever _achieve_ perfection, I still would not be happy, which told me that perfectionism was NOT value-added, if happiness is the goal. I acknowledge all that I gained from my perfectionism, but now, at my age (I just had a birthday, which precipitated a lot of this), I see that striving for better is just a habit I need to break. There’s no one left to please or make proud except for me and my wife, and I know she’s proud of my accomplishments…so it’s just me who needs to catch up with real life.
Thanks for your thoughts. –k
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Thank you for this epiphany. Perfect timing!
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