Do you find yourself to be a perfectionist?
Do you mull over projects and assignments for hours and hours, diligently working to fix every little thing?
Are you finding you are never satisfied with the end result because “it could have been better?”
Ah … you are a perfectionist!
While desiring to do things well is a great characteristic, this characteristic can have a lot of negative impact attached.
Perfectionism, if not balanced, can lead to mental, physical, and even spiritual exhaustion.
It can also lead to paralysis.
The desire to be “perfect” can cause us to lag behind in productivity and even stop us in our tracks at times.
I know because I have suffered with perfection paralysis for years.
I was constantly overthinking every little decision … to the point I would literally find myself and my productivity frozen.
Trying to be perfect is a sign of something much deeper going on inside.
The fear of making mistakes …
The fear of being wrong …
The fear of people thinking less of you …
What perfectionism actually DOES accomplish is keeping you stuck in self-criticism and inaction.
Learn how to kick paralyzing perfectionism to the curb in today’s episode.
Listen in and be inspired!
TRANSCRIPT
Done is Better than Perfect
Welcome to the Unstick Your Mind podcast on Mimika TV. Get ready to get unstuck, aligned with your true purpose, and unlock your God given potential.
Always felt this pull for something bigger, like we were made to do something bigger than we could see right now. It’s always holding that space for that vision that you know there’s something within you and that you can’t really tell what it is. You don’t know the how. You just kind of know it’s like this in what I call an invisible beacon that keeps driving you forward to the next best, bigger thing. Sometimes things happen. And even when I started that journey, my photography business was my baby, was my passion. You know, I wanted to pursue my passion. I wanted to do something artistic and then I turned it into a business and then became hard work. And then eventually the passion dies out. That’s why I always say, follow your heart, but don’t think passion’s going to get you there.
Cause eventually passion is like gas, it eventually runs out. You have to have a bigger reason why you’re doing things. But at the same time, I always felt like, there’s something bigger I’m meant to do. I really always felt from a child. I was meant to help and transform lives. And it didn’t feel like transformative enough. Like I’ve always felt there was some bigger picture to the reason art, why I’m here. And of course I created a lot of my resilience to my faith because without faith and God, I’d be like a hot mess right now. Like always thinking there’s got to be a purpose. There’s got to be a greater reason why I’m doing things. I always like to think of our lives in seasons. Like we see the seasons outside the window. We can’t all stay in summer, all year long.
There has to be moments of winter where things die down the fruit, you can’t see on the trees, the leaves bear and then these, but there’s lots of germination and development that the soil is doing. And a lot of us fight the winter seasons, the seasons where we don’t see fruit when we don’t see growth. It’s the difference between perfection and excellence. And the thing is perfection is about me. It’s like, I want to be perfect because there’s, I have a high standard about myself. Cause I think I’m worried about what other people think, but excellence is doing it with a passion and a purpose is knowing that you’re doing it because it’s the right thing to do. Like I, as now I channel that what used to be perfectionism and wanting to fix things and make things look pretty and clean.
Like as a branding strategist, to me, things have to look good. And it’s not to say, I’m worried about what people think, but I want to prove. I want to present a good product. Like I believe I’m a brand ambassador for what God’s work is in whichever shape or form. And if I’m going to be a brand ambassador, I’d better make sure to step up and do it right because I am mortified to deliver anything other than top quality. Like I will not do it if it’s going to be half done. But again, it’s going to be the right motivation right now. This doesn’t mean it gets stuck in perfection paralysis and you never do something. And there is a saying that I’ve had to come to acknowledge and embrace. As a recovering, perfectionist is done; it’s better than perfect because your brain needs done. It needs completion.
Done is Better than Perfect
It needs to be able to have some kind of finishing. I did this. I’m finished. Why, if you think about it, why do we have funerals and birthdays and graduations and weddings? It’s because we are wired to have markers in our lives. We are wired to have completion of chapters and starting. It’s like a book. You can’t just read a book with one, if it was one long chapter, oh my gosh. Like my brain would hurt, right? Why do we have these beginning and endings? It’s because your brain needs some kind of finality, like graduation. Like my eldest just graduated from college and she managed to walk and have a graduation ceremony, but it was going, it was fifty-fifty at one stage. We weren’t even sure. And she has friends who graduated the year before because of COVID in 2020, they didn’t have life graduations.
And those kids are suffering with a lack of closure. They don’t know how to step into their new because they kind of feel like they haven’t put an end to the old. So the same thing works. And I was explaining this to someone this morning. If you looked at TV shows, we binge on, it has been by design. They have, they have designed the storyline to what we call open and closing a loop. If you’ve ever binge washed in whatever program, they start with the conflict and then you have the characters that overcome it. Then there’s like, “Yeah, she overcame it.” That’s great done, play but now let’s create another drama and leave on a cliff hanger because they want you to keep watching. And your brain is wired for that constant drama like, “Oh, what’s going to happen? What’s going to happen? What’s going to happen?”
But with society and technology, it’s kept us with like a finger in the plug. What’s going to happen? What’s going to happen?
We never get a chance to say it’s done like children’s books. And Cinderella had a [inaudible 00:04:31] happy ending, the end, close the book we want. Our brains are seeking the resolution. But with modern society in the way that marketers are actually doing this on purpose in the news, if you always wonder why you get hooked on the news, it’s because of this, it’s actually a psychological tool they use on you or click baits on YouTube or Facebook or whatever so you feel like you can’t look away. It’s because of this whole process where it’s feeding your brain with this constant need and this like, “Ooh, I just learned something new! Ooh, I know somebody, Something doesn’t, somebody else doesn’t know.” We never have closure.
So if you’re struggling with overwhelm, one of the first things I say to people is what are you doing right now that you can finish and close the loop?
Stop, pause, and celebrate.
Done is Better than Perfect
“Yay. I went to the gym today. I did actually did it.” Instead of beating yourself up about the last 30 days when you didn’t go like really.
We need to really start to make our market decisions. Work for us, not against us, which means celebrating the wins, allowing your brain to close the loop and see closure on whatever you’ve started. Because I know women, especially, we are terrible when it comes to a never ending to-do list. And we always beat ourselves up with the long list to-dos and never really give ourselves credit for the stuff that we have done. We need to start celebrating those things and say, there’s a closure to this.
This is a beginning of something. Growth can often feel like grieving. What I mean by this is that when you are changing and when you are growing and you are stretching your brain into areas, it hasn’t been before you are letting go of the old, the old way of thinking, the old habits, the old environment, the old relationships with yourself and with others. And when you’re letting go and saying goodbye to something, it can be, it can feel sad and it can feel horrible. But a lot of the time we don’t realize is that we need that closure. We need to allow ourselves to say, thank you. There was a great experience. It’s like, why do we cry at weddings? Why do we cry at graduations? It’s because we know that something is coming to an end and it’s okay to cry. It’s okay to be sad, but it means that you’re opening the loop in the beginning of the chapter on something new, which will then create something happy.
So I would say just embrace it. Don’t fight it, but know that your brain, you can get your brain to work for you and not against you. Because I’m always looking for women that I know have the same story as me who have need that boost and that change. And knowing that they need the help that they can get unstuck, because it’s like a car, right? You know, you could keep spinning your wheels and putting more gas on the pedal all, but you’re going to just fly mud everywhere. If you don’t get that vehicle unstuck from where it is stuck, get it out of the ditch and into, onto the road again, that’s part of what we do is help you get you back into functioning, where you should be and align to where on the road that you need to be on and really help to find that transformation.
Done is Better than Perfect
And it’s really, it’s a process. And that’s what I just enjoy to me. That’s the most life changing thing. And the most fulfilling thing is seeing others go through this process and that it really helps them with their lives and their thinking. It’s a growth journey like you never arrived. None of us can call ourselves experts because we always learning. And as long as you remain teachable and coachable for me, I’m like a little kid in the candy store when it comes to, “Oh, I learn something new!”
And I think that’s where you all find the greatest relief is when you know that you don’t have to be all things to all people and that if you’re open to allow yourself to be stretched, that’s when the greatest growth happens is when you can be willing to relieve sight of the shore to discover new horizons.
Are you ready to change your brain to change your life? Discover how to break limiting beliefs, stop self sabotage and unlock your full potential by rewiring your brain using neuroscience coaching and faith-based principles. Come and join my coaching program. Unstick your mind today.
Come and join my coaching program Unstick Your Mind today!
