Psquared

Perfectionism is simply fear.  It can be fear of failure or fear of success, or fear of vulnerability or fear of fame.  Regardless, the result is inertia.  Does this feel familiar?

I call it Perfection Paralysis (P² for short) and it’s one of my greatest challenges.  There’s a red flag that goes up in my belly when I slide into P².  I might moan about my P², or justify why I’m not good enough to do what I should be doing, or resign myself to my debilitating P² and watch TED videos while feeling guilty.  But whining and guilt are a distraction from doing the real work of facing our fears head on and then delivering a Good Enough product.

The Perfectionists “Good Enough” is generally perceived by the audience as an Olympic 10.  There are 2 points to address here:

1. Your intention versus what is perceived –
   There’s no way we can say that Salvador Dali’s paintings are less than 100% of his effort because we can’t climb inside his head and heart to define a metric against which to measure.
2. Pleasing all the people all the time –
   It ain’t gonna happen, so let this one go.  Some people are willing to pay $5million for a Dali painting and others don’t get his work at all.

There is a choice for us Perfectionists.  We can let P² distract us from doing anything productive or we can create Good work that may be perceived as Great.