Seeking Perfection Holds You Back: Here are 4 Ways To Get Unstuck!

Perfection is a contradictory concept. It is ingrained in everything we do and how we do it. Perfection is an absolute measure of success, doing things just right, creating something without a blemish. Our longing for perfection shows up everywhere. Seeking a perfect partner, training for a perfect score, searching for a perfect project or waiting for a perfect time. There is nothing wrong with reaching and aspiring for greater results, but longing for perfection has its dark side. It keeps us stuck. Paralyzed. Stagnant. And fearful. 

We stagnate in our careers because we are “just not ready yet”, we delay our projects because we need “just a little more time to evaluate and review”, we never have that important conversation because “the timing just wasn't right”. 

In our personal lives, being chained by perfection, costs us our happiness and fulfillment. If we are stuck seeking perfection in our business or at work, we sustain losses in opportunity cost and waste resources that could have been spent somewhere else with greater value. 

I, myself, have a terrible habit of getting in analysis paralysis, seeking that ever evading perfection. But in order to keep moving, I keep searching for cures and tools to help me get unstuck. Below are my top four, which I’m excited to share with you! 

• Start where you are. If I were to get a tattoo, this is what it would say. “Start Where You Are”. Have you been wanting to learn a new skill, try a new career path, or start a hobby? Start where you are. You do not need to make a long list of prerequisites. You already have all you need to get going. One of the good examples is going for a PMP certification exam. It is very common that people would want to go for it, but they don’t. They study, they study and study and they postpone and postpone the exam. Take the exam. Go for it. If you fail - retake it. We will talk a little more about failure later. Here is my own example. I have been wanting to start my YouTube channel for years. First, I told myself: I don’t have the right equipment, I don’t know how to do editing, I don’t … the list went on. Well, I am proud to say, one day I started where I was. It is not perfect, but it feels great not to be stuck. You can check out my YouTube channel here. 
• Set time intervals. Agile teams use this principle and it is why agile projects produce results, even if in smaller increments. Here is how it works. You say: “I have two weeks, and I am going to do as much as practical in these two weeks, and when two weeks are gone, I will be done”.  When you have a commitment that you only have X amount of time and no more, you tend to look at your tasks differently, pick the tasks of the highest value and complete them faster. 
• Be in the NOW. This is not about meditation or mindfulness. This is about helping yourself not to be so fixated on the end goal. It is very hard to do, because everything in our life is structured around chasing goals: get that many steps per day, eat that many calories, close that many sales, complete that many deliverables by Tuesday. Goals are great. Goals keep us focused. But surprisingly, fixating on the goals makes us miss all the fun and robs us from the energy to enjoy the process, look around, retrospect and learn. Being in the now frees some of the energy attached to the goal chasing and gives it back to enjoying the journey. When you have time to notice and enjoy the process, then perfection becomes more of an ideal that inspires, rather than a heavy burden that freezes you up with anxiety. 
• Failure is your friend. I have a silly article I wrote some time ago - I Want You To Fail. Check it out after you read this. But for now, let’s think: Why do we hold on to the notion of perfection? Why do we have to be perfect or do things perfectly? Look inside? What do you see? When I look inside my motivations for perfection, I see the fear of failure. I am so afraid to fail, that I would use my perfectionism as a shield and an exercise. It is much easier and socially acceptable to say: I am not done yet, because I want this to be perfect, then to admit: I am not done yet, because I am petrified that if I move on, I will fail. I think the cure is not to say: Ah! Do not be afraid to fail! Not a big deal! The cure is to redefine what failure means to you. Failure is a teacher, failure is a friend, failure is how we learn, and how we become more compassionate and humane. 

What do you think? Are you a perfectionist? Do you think perfection is something that we need to promote in ourselves, in our businesses, in our company cultures? Or could it be a hindrance? 

Please share your thoughts in the comments. 

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