Note from a Recovering Perfectionist

I am not perfect.  Never have been, never will be.  Neither are you.

Perhaps that desire to try to achieve perfection isn't a struggle for you, but for those of you who always want to try a little harder, give a little more, get good grades, never let anyone down, aim to be please - you are my people... and this post is aimed for you today.

I like to think of myself as a "Recovering Perfectionist" as if I don't still fall in that trap, but sadly, some days it is less recovering and more aiming for a ridiculous standard.  Case in point, me, today, out shoveling the snow on my driveway.  I had the driveway cleared by all normal standards, but kept going back to these little spots where the blacktop was gathering white.  And yes, I will acknowledge that some of that was due to continued falling and blowing light snow, but I wanted it all off.  I wanted the driveway to be completely cleared.  Why?  Was it going to impact me or anyone coming in or out of my driveway?  No.  Was it actually important that every area of snow and ice was completely gone?  No.  Was I cold and ready to come back inside?  Yes.  So why did I keep going?

That voice in my head was telling me that more was possible and that it was a snow day so there was no excuse that I didn't have enough time to get it done right.  Ugh.

So here is what I can tell you... right this moment there are still a few spots of snow out on places of my driveway, but it was absolutely done well and even great by most standards.  When I was growing up my mom always used to say to me, "It doesn't matter if you are THE best as long as you do YOUR best."  It is a mantra that helped me often.  (And yes, I even repeated it to myself a few times out shoveling today.)

Now, I tend to take that one step further by asking myself, "Am I doing the best I can with the tools and resources I have in this moment?"  I love that question.  Because my best is going to be different depending on the moment and the circumstances.  Your best is different too!  When we haven't had enough sleep, when our stress levels are high, when time is limited, and when we don't have the skills to do more, then our best is less than when we are well rested, our stress levels are manageable, we have enough time and we are well practiced and prepared.  So doing our best will look different based upon the circumstances we are facing in that moment.

Obviously the doing YOUR best mantra and reflection question are fine for shoveling a driveway, but they play a much bigger role in getting yourself out of the desire to try to be perfect - because you're not - and that is just as it should be so try to stop being so hard on yourself and really pause to self-reflect and think about what you are doing or expecting out of yourself because my guess is it might not be very realistic or reasonable.

PS - I love snow days!  I hope you enjoyed yours too!