Perfectionism

Only doing stuff that you are good at makes your world smaller. Perfect keeps you stuck in a loop of only doing the things you feel you can succeed in.

If we walked around only doing the things we felt we could have success in, we'd never grow and expand.

Perfectionism can take on many forms. And is generally created from some belief that you will receive something on the other side of a perfect accomplishment. If everything is in order and I have developed the answer to a question then I receive acceptance or approval.

Let's try an activity. I want you to think about some aspect of your life, or some activity you aren't very good at. Could be something like sports, or maybe it's planning, or maybe its social interaction. Any topic area will do. Now take a deep dive into that aspect. Look at the different times you've engaged in that activity. There's maybe several instances, maybe even from childhood.

What comes up when you reflect? I'm going to generalize three main areas that may have come up.

1. You engaged in this activity, maybe even multiple times but once you start doing it you realize you don't enjoy it much and just want to quit.

2. You engage in the activity and realize it's harder than you thought, the learning curve is really steep, so you just don't want to invest the time.

3. You engage in the activity and a story comes up. A story is something behind the scenes that you tell yourself, usually a judgement, or a maybe even an incident from earlier in your life.

All of these perspectives require a deeper dive below the surface of what that is. And allowing some reflection on what's going on. If this is an area of your life that is impacted and you aren't sure how to start to address. Start with the questions above, and build on this to understand how you can grow in this area. Some really great questions you could include.

What does it look like if I can live my life without this aspect? Does it feel more expanded or contracted? If this is an area I want to develop further, how would I start that? What is one small step that I could do in the next week to move me in that direction? If there is a story attached, is this really the truth of who I am? Or did I accept that from someone else? What would be on the other side of freeing myself from perfection?

I hope you enjoyed this and if you have areas you are still currently struggling or need to expand further I'm happy to meet with you to help identify how to create a way to your best path.

I conduct sessions over the phone and via Skype. Visit my website for more details.