It's Not Happening

Taking care of ourselves means being able to set clear boundaries. It means being able to say, ”no”--even when we are enticed by the worthiness of the cause or the people involved in it.

 We tend to ignore that we have run out of steam, that our commitments are over the top and we’ll say, “yes” anyway. We can’t help it. Poor humans that we are, we want to be indispensible, to prove our worthiness to others and to ourselves. We want to be perfect.

According to Brene Brown in her book, The Gifts Of Imperfection, perfectionism is a “2 ton shield against the perceived judgment of the world. Perfectionism is, at its core, about trying to earn approval and acceptance.”

“Somewhere along the line,” Brown tells us, “we adopted the idea that I am what I accomplish and how well I accomplish it.”

You’ve heard the expression? Rather than human beings, we have turned into human doings?

I’m not saying don’t do your best. Of course we want to do our best in our work and in our relationships, even when we are shoveling snow off the walk.

But could we relax? Could we surrender our compulsive attempts to be flawless? No one is, no one ever will be. It’s not happening.

Releasing the drive for perfection, let’s aim, instead, for a comfortable and kindly self-acceptance. The bottom line is that we all want to be loved and, you may have noticed, it’s really hard to love someone who is always trying to be perfect. There’s a strict quality to that striving that makes getting close a real challenge.

It’s far, far easier to love a person who slips on life’s banana peels now and then and can laugh about it.