Category: Limiting Belief

Don’t Let Perfection Get in the Way

Perfection is defined as reaching the highest attainable standard. In my experience we are sometimes stalled by focusing on perfection. If you have ever delayed taking action because you are afraid that you are not ready or something is not good enough, then you understand how perfection can get in the way of progress. Here are some thoughts on perfection.

1. Don’t confuse perfection and excellence. Excellence requires great results, not perfect results. Release yourself from perfection and create  excellence.

2. Action provides the process to change a vision of perfection into something tangible. Any form of perfection, or even excellence, only resides within our mind until we take action. Ideas need to be turned into results which can only happen with action..

3. Mistakes drive improvement. We improve through practice. We learn from mistakes. We can only get better by making the mistakes that provide insight into advancement.

“Perfection belongs to narrated events, not to those we live.” said Primo Levi. Life is messy. Only in our minds can perfection exist, and I don’t want to let it get in my way.

You Can’t Go Back

I read constantly, both fiction and non-fiction. When I am reading a fictional tale, I enjoy finding a life lesson revealed within the context of the story.

Here is an except from Mad Ship by Robin Hobb. Wintrow is depressed because his life is way off the course he had planned. Mostly due to unfortunate events that were out of his control.

He shook his head sadly, “I do not know. Perhaps it is, for other folk, I only know it was not what I was accustomed to, nor what I expected. I keep trying to think of a way to get back to where I was and restore my life to what it is supposed to be, but—”

“You can’t go back,” she told him bluntly. Her voice was neither kind or unkind. “That part of your life is over. Set it aside as something you have finished. Complete, or no, it is done with you. No being gets to decide what his life is ‘supposed to be.’” She lifted her eyes and her gaze stabbed him. “Be a man. Discover where you are now, and go on from there, making the best of things. Accept your life, and you might survive it. If you hold back from it, insisting this is not your life, not where you are meant to be, life will pass you by. You may not die from such foolishness, but you might as well be dead for all the good your life will do you or anyone else.”

Do you ever find yourself trying to go back in time? It is only natural to think that we can fix things by putting them back to the way they were before. Life just doesn’t work that way!

I find that when I am facing a difficult situation, it is important to remember not to try to undo the past, but to chart a new future. I must evaluate the current situation, learn from the past, but move forward.

This may seem easy as you read this example, but subconsciously we want to go back to a time when we were comfortable. I try to recognize when I fall into this trap. It is true. We cannot go back.

Triumph Over Challenges

Theodore Roosevelt said, “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.”

The sweet joy of triumph! When we succeed at a challenging task, solve a complicated problem, or reach a goal, we rejoice. We are elated. Failures fade away because we have achieved a milestone.

Would we know the feeling of triumph without the awareness of defeat? Isn’t our recognition of a win enhanced by the missteps we made along the way?

Every day I must remind myself that it is imperative to risk failure in order to find success. If I wait for the best opportunity, then I will miss many openings for progress. So many of our daily decisions are affected by timing. Yet rarely is our timing perfect.

If we want success and to experience triumph, then we must act. Nelson Mandela said, “I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”

Today was made for challenges. Today was made for triumph. We can take the leap of faith that is needed to overcome.

 

Can We Change?

“Tomorrow we will become what we choose today. To change means to choose to change.” – John C. Maxwell

I love this quote because there is so much wisdom in just fifteen words.

1. Change takes time. We must work today for what we want tomorrow. Our focus needs to be on the future. Very little permanent change occurs within one day.

2. Change is a choice. It will not occur without intent. We have the opportunity to decide what we wish to change.

3. Change is never ending. Every day we can work towards tomorrow’s goals. Incremental change has a huge impact over a lifetime of effort.

Often we stumble on these points, and we don’t change as much as we expect. We can choose to change to meet our goals in our professional life, our personal life, in our diet, our exercise, or our habits. Can we change? Each day we can strive to make ourselves better tomorrow.