Hey Team,
I spent a lot of time trying to draw today’s star.
I started drawing a background last night, creating something with circles of different colours but I couldn’t seem to bring it together – it just looked like random circles. So, I partially covered it with black and was trying to cover the remaining parts with white to make a striped pattern but it just came out looking weird. I actually liked the effect but it didn’t work as the background for a star.
So I did a new one this morning and even after adding the star I couldn’t get this one to look the way I wanted either. It looked fine but it wasn’t quite right so I started tinkering with it, adding bits of gold here and there and trying to figure out what I needed in order to make the drawing work.
And, in the course of tinkering, I realized a few things:
- I was running out of time to write today
- The star is only part of my project and I can’t spend all my time on just that part
- Done beats perfect every time and I can just declare myself done.
So, I promptly decided that my drawing was done and it was time to write.
My writing will also be imperfect but I’m just going to live with that, too.
Why am I telling you all of this?
Because Done Beats Perfect works just as well for your practices as it does for my drawing (and writing.)
You can do what you can and declare your imperfect practice done for the day.
I have spent an awful a lot of time in my life not doing things at all because I didn’t have time/energy/information to do them right – whatever “right” meant for me in that moment.
When it came to a workout or a well-being practice, “right” usually meant exactly as I had planned or exactly as I had been instructed. If I didn’t have enough time or if I couldn’t do one of the exercises, I wouldn’t do any of them because that would be doing them wrong or taking the easy way out.
And somehow my brain convinced me that if I couldn’t do it “right” then it was better not to exercise/journal/meditate at all
Which is, of course, complete crap
I’m not a surgeon or a pilot, my practices were never precision tasks.
In fact, I have always had a very, very, very, very wide range of good enough. I didn’t even to get within shouting distance of perfect.
And that’s why, now that I am more aware of that thinking trap, I spend a lot of my time reminding myself that Done Beats Perfect.
(In fact, for the sake of catchiness, I usually say Done Beats Perfect Every Time but I do know that there are exceptions!)
Yes, there are definitely procedures and safety protocols and proper form for various exercises and practices and you may need to take those into account.
But even including those things you will still have a wide range of ‘good enough’ for any practice you are undertaking.
And a work out that is done imperfectly is much more useful that a workout you didn’t do at all.*
If today’s workout only includes 20 squats instead of 30 or if you only journal for 5 mins instead of 15 or if you can’t face meditation and you colour instead, you are still better off than if you skipped your practice entirely.
To summarize: Do it imperfectly. Declare yourself done. Get on with your day.
So, Team, today I would like to invite you to join me in imperfection in our practices (and our drawing, our writing, and our lives in general.)
Very few things need to be done perfectly and we can really benefit from the things we do imperfectly.
Or to be short and snappy – Done Beats Perfect. Every Time.
It’s really worth giving imperfection a try.
And in celebration of our imperfect efforts, I offer you this imperfect gold star.
Go Team Us!
* If you find yourself avoiding or adapting your practices again and again, it may signal that you need to change your plans over all. Or if you are mostly ok with your plan but you have to change it fairly regularly, you may want to adjust your expectations a little so you don’t get stressed out about your results.