Being imperfect

Extract from another blog which I really liked :)

Perfection is a bitch. And severely overrated.

The way to achieve excellence in anything is to focus on the moment-to-moment experience of it, to learn how to find pleasure in the actual learning of the thing — the slow deep attainment of mastery — of true knowing — instead of trying to rush ahead to the final product because of some image in our heads of what it will look like to others and how sexy it will make us.

We want perfection and we want it now.

We don’t want the tedium of repeating things we’re still too uncomfortable with to actually enjoy yet.

So we get caught up in the story going on inside our heads (I’m a loser, this is stupid, I’m no good at it, what’s for dinner, when is this class going to end, that guy with the tattoo is kind of hot, why is she wearing such an unflattering outfit) that disconnects us from the present moment and all the richness of learning, of direct contact with the world outside our heads, the moment always offers.

And when we disconnect, when we stop paying attention, sooner or later we forget why we’re doing what we’re doing in the first place. We get discouraged. We quit.

Thing is, we learn and grow through the very fact, the awkward reality, of imperfection. With each mistake the brain is forced to stop, go over what went wrong, compare it to the model and make the adjustments. The brain must slow down and pay deep attention: thus, it learns. (This is what ‘deliberate practice’ is all about.)

We feel so threatened and shamed by our own imperfection that we banish it to the shadows. As we grow up, we learn to craft our persona according to outside expectations: we keep the elements of ourselves that bring love, attention and pleasure, while disowning those that cause us pain.

Perfection is about being safe, secure and controlled.

Imperfection is about being messy, flawed, and out of control.

If perfection is what is good, and rewarded, then imperfection is bad and invites scorn and punishment.

And yet it’s the willingness to be imperfect that contains the treasure chest of our own creativity.