Imperfection and Impermanence
I used to get mad at myself a lot. I just used to get mad a lot. And a lot of it had to do with me not measuring up to something, but I didn’t know what. So I became rebellious, cantankerous, judgmental.
In the past couple years I’ve realized a lot of it had to do with me wanting others to see my worth, or just wanting to be seen in general. And it seemed like in order to do that I had to be perfect. Look perfect, sound perfect, do everything perfectly.
How I went through over three decades without knowing I was a closet perfectionist I don’t know. (Something to do with denial, I’m sure, since being cool meant - in the 90’s anyway - that you didn’t care about anything at all.) And like most other things you come to learn about yourself, once you’re aware of it, it’s pretty damn hard to unsee.
Perfectionism is insidious. It can hide under the guise of “hard-working” or “do-it-all” or “superman/woman” or “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” mentality. All those hours spent obsessing, strategizing, neglecting sleep/rest, and then eventually falling into the cycle of burnout, resentment, numbing or acting out, and ultimately bitterness - because perfection can never be achieved. It’s the carrot we dangle in front of ourselves even though no matter how long we chase it it will always be just that few inches out of reach, while a toxic coach - that voice in our heads - vacillates between violent berating and conditional love, telling us if we’d only buy this product or lose more sleep or hate ourselves more we’d get there if we really wanted it.
It can also show up as paralysis analysis, procrastination, self-defeatism (if you don’t try you’ll never fail), depression, and a buttload of anxiety.
While I still struggle with perfectionism sometimes, I’ve come to realize that whatever is going on out there is never as important as whatever is going on in here. Anything external is out of our control. Our bodies, our surroundings, our environment, our friends, our family, our work and coworkers. There are certainly actions we can take to affect these external factors, hopefully in our favor, but ultimately it all starts with our thoughts, the internal part, and that’s the only thing we can control. And most of the time, perfectionism starts with how we want others to perceive us, which once again, is out of our control.
Something that’s really helped me on this journey of getting comfortable with imperfection is knowing that literally nothing stays the same. Oh, you hate everything going on right now? No worries! Things will change. Oh, you love everything as it is right now? Awesome! It’ll definitely change. Basically, the only thing you can count on is that everything changes. Not necessarily for better or worse, just not the same. And you can either meet it with crippling anxiety, overwhelming cynicism, or genuine curiosity and unfathomable hope. As hard as change can be sometimes, I think it would be harder to stay the same. Sometimes I think all life is is just a series of experiences, either teaching us something or trying to, depending on how open we are to receiving it. And knowing that brings a degree of nonpartisanship to it. The thing will happen no matter what. How we choose to perceive and respond to it is up to us. And to recognize how insufferably boring life would be if everything and everyone was perfect. It’d be predictable, rigid and robotic. Essentially, the very opposite of life.
I’m almost four decades old now, and no one is guaranteed another decade. The only thing that is perfect in life is the fragility of it, the impersonality of it. Cells will keep dividing and growing until they don’t. Our bodies will keep aging until they don’t. So all I can ask for is the privilege of being able to participate every day. Trying something new, doing something new, being something new. And the freedom comes from knowing it doesn’t have to be perfect, because it never will be. Perfection was never the point. Living is.
Knowing that change is unavoidable, perhaps we can choose the direction we’d like that change to be. I spent most of my life being frustrated with myself for not having the perfect feelings, being a perfect daughter, knowing the perfect thing to say or do in every situation. It meant examining every past moment to critique and not repeat any perceived mistake, to constantly edit myself when I even had a remote suspicion of disfavor from others. It meant being anxious about future events where I might embarrass myself, or not be seen as perfect in any way. Basically, obsessing about perfection prevented me from ever experiencing the present moment, which is so much more important than my perception of others' perception of me.
All this anxiety of perception is just that - worrying about something immaterial. Other’s thoughts are just as inconsequential as my own. They don’t do anything. The thoughts come and they’re usually just based on programming and conditioning. None of it is real. None of it is us. When I’m frustrated, overbearingly caring, or unshakably confident, I sound like my dad. When I’m displeased, delighted, or gently nurturing, I sound like my mom. Knowing this, I ask myself, which response is me?
If you can let go of what you think it should be, you start making room for it is. Acceptance becomes the only sane way to live. There’s more room to make mistakes. There’s more room to slow down, and let things unfold as they do, not as we wish they would. There’s more room to just be - with myself, with other people, without the expectation of how it needs to be. And always reminding myself, be here, now. The next second will bring about something different, and no matter how I feel about it, it will change.
