Progress, not perfection is the key.

I am always struck at people’s streak of perfectionism. I like it when everything ends up neat and perfect, but have experienced enough of life to know that perfect doesn’t always mean progress.

Plenty of things can be “perfect” but a hot mess behind the scenes. If I can claim the hot mess, I can put some order to it and move in the right direction. I don’t need to be perfect, I just need to make progress.

I wrote about a health challenge back in May. At the time, it seemed big and insurmountable, but there was something I could do each day to go in the right direction. Collect those actions over eight months and they add up to good results, moving in the right direction. You are all aware that most days, it feels like nothing is happening and you are never getting where you are going. If you don’t start and keep at it, you aren’t getting anywhere.

This can apply to all situations. I have never been great at typing. I never took a typing class in school and for most of my career, I was also typing in French, so stopping to add accents slowed me down. When I switched to online teaching, I realized that never really putting time into that skill and practicing was costing me time. I have been practicing- not perfect, but I am making progress.

A friend just had a birthday, when asked how he felt about it, he said I feel like I haven’t really started living yet. That was not the time or place to dive into the questions I have about the why in that statement. Waking up on my birthday is a great gift, I am given another chance, another moment to add joy to the world. Maybe he feels that way because there is a dream in him that has not yet come to pass. There is still time, he can still have it, he just needs to believe it’s possible and keep going in that direction.

The holidays are coming….soon. Will your table decor be perfect? Will everything go as planned? That would be fantastic, but I doubt it’s going to be as “perfect” as you think. One Christmas, we were planning on driving to my brother’s (45 min drive) for a Christmas meal. There was a terrible snowstorm, it was not advisable to drive anywhere, so we just stayed home and made a meal of what we were taking and other things from the cupboard. It was far from perfect, but it was still fun.

Whatever your challenges as the year winds down whether it is with your family, in your career, or something to do with your health, don’t strive for perfection, look for progress instead. Progress means I’m getting there, I’m just not there yet. You can work with that. 🙂