The Trouble With Being Perfect

Let me preface this post by saying: I am not perfect. I have never claimed to be, nor will I ever be perfect. It has taken me a long time to realize that. Of course I knew I wasn't perfect. What I didn't know is that I didn't HAVE to be.

I've always been a perfectionist. I felt an enormous self-imposed pressure to be perfect. My mother always told me, "You don't have to be THE best, but you do have to be YOUR best." Solid advice that I've repeated numerous times. But in my mind, I still felt like there was no room for failure, flaws, or faults. That kind of motivation can lead to great successes, but it doesn't come without a cost.

Trying to be perfect when you never will takes an emotional toll of you. You never stop feeling that pressure. Nothing is ever good enough. Even successes are overanalyzed or attributed to something else. It wears on you. It's like running a race that has no finish line.

The trouble with being perfect is that you aren't. You can't be. And by "You" I mean me. I'm not. I'm far from it. I thought I had to be or I'd disappoint people. So I spent so long trying to be perfect that I've missed opportunities to be imperfect. Yes, I said opportunities. Flaws make us unique. Faults provide areas for growth and improvement. Failure is one of the best teachers there is. By accepting, dealing with, and learning from imperfections, mistakes, failures, we get to be better people that we were before. And how awesome us that?

There's nothing wrong with striving for perfection. But I'm learning that I shouldn't let it become a burden for me. What a relief it is to know that it's OKAY if I make a mistake. It's like I tell my children: a mistake is okay, but you have to learn from it. I want them to understand that, so why wouldn't I accept the that truth for myself?

This is about more than a poor self image. I find myself with imperfect judgement. Imperfect faith. I want to make the right choices. The best decision. I want my life to be all sunshine and smooth sailing and smiles. We all do. But it doesn't work that way. Bad things happen. Mistakes are made. Life gets hard. For everyone. It doesn't mean anything is wrong with YOU. It's just the reality of life.

I don't always get it right, make the best choice, know exactly how to handle a situation. I'm human. I'm normal. I'm a mess. But whenever things go wrong, for whatever reason, there is some lesson in it for me. The trick to to find that lesson without letting the mistakes, failures, or trials defeat me first. Easier said than done, at times. So, when I feel like the world is landing more punches than I can fend off, I'm reminded of James 1:2-4

   Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

So, while I may never be perfect, I can be made more perfect by allowing myself to learn from my imperfections. And that, my friends, is pretty perfect to me. 

The Shoe Rack

I've managed to accumulate quiet a few pairs of shoes over the years. Running shoes, boots, heels, flats, you name it. They had progressively spilled out of my closet and into my bedroom floor, finding a semi-permanent home behind the bedroom door. Needless to say, my bedroom was a mess. I needed to do something.

I was tired of all that mess. Every single time I walked into my room, there was that mess, just lying there. I couldn't take it anymore, so I went to the store and bought a shoe rack. I brought it home, tore open the box, and excitedly began assembling the pieces. I've never put anything together by myself before, but this seemed easy. There weren't too many pieces. In fact, I didn't even need tools. So, I briefly glanced over the minimal directions and hurriedly began piecing together by brand-new organizational solution. This was going to be great! My shoes would be neat and tidy. My whole bedroom would look better. I was pumped! This was awesome…

For about 5 minutes. Then I realized that I didn't know which side was up. And how does this piece fit into that one so that the sides matched up properly. Uh oh… My fantastic new shoe rack was a jumble or parts. Nothing looked right. There was no way that it would ever hold shoes. What could I do?

Calm down. no big deal. All I had to do was go back to the directions. So I did. I read them from beginning to end. The whole process condensed into about 5 easy steps. I could do that. But before I could properly construct my life-changing shoe rack, I had to break it back down. And as I pulled the pieces apart, I started thinking about all of the other times I've tried to build things without consulting the instructions. And I realized a couple of things.

Sometimes, I get so busy planning this crazy life of mine, trying to figure everything out, that I forget a very important step. I need to consult the instructions. Too often, I think I need to take care of things on my own. I think, I've got this. I'm good. Things are fine. Then I look around and realize what a huge mess I've made. God has it all laid out for me. I don't have to guess or wonder or try to figure it out. It's right there in His Word. Romans 15:4 tells me, For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope. 

Okay….read the instructions from now own. Got it. But what about the times I failed to do so in the past? I've got plenty of poorly constructed shoe racks in my life. Ah, the shoe rack! The good news is, even though I'd made a mess of it, hope was not lost. It could be fixed! But not before I took it completely apart. 

So many times, we go through this life making bad decision after bad decision…mistakes on top of mistakes. We haven't read the instructions and things are a total mess. There is hope. You can fix it…well, God can fix it. But sometimes, in order to get it right, things have to be completely broken down. You have to reach the bottom and start over. Clean slate. From scratch. Remember that when everything is falling apart. 

Author Marianne Williamson wrote, "Something very beautiful happens to people when their world has fallen apart: a humility, a nobility, a higher intelligence emerges at just the point when our knees hit the floor. Perhaps, in a way, that's where humanity is now: about to discover we're not as smart as we thought we were, will be forced by life to surrender our attacks and defenses which avail us of nothing, and finally break through into the collective beauty of who we really are." 

Life will break us down. When it does, rejoice! Here is your chance to get it right. If I hadn't needed that shoe rack, I might've given up on it when I realized it was a mess. I didn't give up. I started over and guess what, my shoe rack works perfectly. When I look at it, I don't see the piece-of-crap-first-attempt. I see the shoe rack as it was meant to be, doing the job it was meant to do. 

Sometimes, we get into a mess. But we can find our way out of it if we will refer back to the instructions. Don't give up. God won't give up on us. He might break us down, but only because He cares enough to put us back together the right way.