Doing The Best We Can
I’m continuing the theme from last week about letting go of perfect. Having concentrated on the debilitating effects of perfectionism, I want to talk about the benefits of simply doing the best we can.
I’ve just read an excellent book by Brene Brown called ‘The Gifts of Imperfection.’
She talks about the difference between perfectionism and healthy achieving.
As ‘Wavy Gravy said
‘We’re all bozos on the bus, so we may as well sit back and enjoy the ride.’
Do we think we must deny and hide any weakness and should appear without any imperfections? Can we accept ourselves as we are when we do perform less than perfectly.
Healthy achieving and personal growth require the ability to change, and change does not occur if we are continuing to hold onto our old habits and ways of thinking.
We benefit from accepting that we are all imperfect beings, doing the best we can with what we have and where we are in life.
Brene Brown refers to three significant patterns that are essential to developing the resilience that we need to help with letting go of perfect and embracing healthy achievement:
Cultivating hope.
Practising critical awareness.
Letting go of dulling our feelings of vulnerability, discomfort and pain.
Hope happens when we believe in ourselves – I can do this.
Hope happens when we can set realistic goals.
Hope happens when we have a sense of how to realistically achieve these goals, which requires us to be flexible and try alternative routes when we’ve been thwarted.
We have the power to create change, and this requires courage, resilience and determination.
Critical awareness is about reality checking the messages that bombard us in every aspect of our lives and avoiding the feelings of not being good enough that trip us up.
Attempts to avoid feelings of vulnerability, discomfort and pain only lead us into behaviours that can be self-destructive. Having compassion for ourselves and acknowledging that we are not alone can be more effective than trying to numb the distress.
We can attempt to numb our emotions in many ways – alcohol; drugs; sex; food; gambling; spending; work; constant change and of course perfectionism. The problem is that when we numb the painful emotions, we also numb the positive ones.
I have spent a huge part of my life in trying to beat those wretched feelings of inadequacy and uncertainty through various addictions and have always ended up feeling worse. I never felt good enough nor could I accept that I was doing the best I could with the resources I had at that time.
When I recovered and had a sense of purpose and perspective in my life, I realised that I was no different from anyone else – the bozos on the bus – imperfect human beings doing our best.
Striving for perfection can go hand in hand with the impossible desire to be happy with constant positive feelings. Which is like shaving off half of our existence.
We all experience the full range of emotion. We can’t just select the good ones, because that is part of the numbing off process, and leads to a slippery slope.
As much as failure is part of our existence, so is experiencing painful and pleasurable emotions. It’s all about how we oversee and accept those emotions.
Becoming comfortable with a life that befits a human being. Not a perfect human being – a vulnerable and fallible human being.
Author of memoir, ‘Wearing Red One Woman’s Journey to Sanity’
Available from www.amazon.co.uk and www.browndogbooks.uk