The Lie of Perfection

If You Wait till You’re Ready, You’ll Wait Forever

I have been working on all kinds of cool ideas. Ideas for this blog, for my other blog, for writing projects, painting projects, photo projects, A PODCAST! And I keep telling myself that as soon as I get everything ready and organized, I’ll launch them.

Then I actually looked at this blog the other day. I knew the last post was a while ago…

But November of 2022? That’s so not what I meant to do. I never mean to do that. But it’s happened several times now. So what’s up?

As I look out the window at the mid-March rain that is falling here in central Virginia, I realize that there’s a lie that keeps tripping me up. A lie I tell myself because it’s convenient, sounds plausible and allows me to avoid the risk of launching all this stuff. I’ve talked about fear before, but this is a different lie.

The lie that says I need everything to be right, everything to be lined up, everything to be PERFECT before I should do anything.

It’s an absurd lie, of course. I don’t even believe in perfection. Humans are innately imperfect. It is the source of our wonder and uniqueness. Striving to be perfect or to create something that is perfect is a defect of ego. Perfection is the aspect of whatever you choose to call the ultimate creative force in the universe, assuming you believe in such a thing. If you believe in random chance in creation, then you know it is filled with imperfections. It is the nature of things.

So when I use “perfection”, or some equally unsuitable euphemism for that condition as a delaying tactic, I’m lying to myself. I’m finding excuses to wait a little longer, delay a little more, and avoid having more of my imperfections on display. It’s a copout. So when I catch myself doing that, I have to make the change.

So starting this week, you’ll be seeing weekly posts on this blog. Some weeks it may only be one post, at the beginning I’m already seeing weeks with two posts. The goal is to increase that to a minimum of two and reach for three or more some weeks. There IS a podcast coming. There are posts about my creative projects coming, up and creative things I’ve seen. I’ll share some things I’m creating for my Instagram account, too.

All of it will be imperfect.

And that’s OK.

Peace.

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