The problem with perfection.
I grew up in the country, on a dirt road with a barn full of animals. My dad enjoyed collecting horses, stray dogs, a menagerie of cats and whatever other random animals he came across. I had a love/hate relationship with where we lived. On one hand, there was a magnificent backdrop of woods with a stream to explore. All that beauty inspires my work now. On the other, there was horseflies and gnats, poison ivy every Summer and So.Much.Dirt.
A lone car would kick up a dust cloud that you could see coming from a mile away. If it rained, there would be mud on the animals, on the wheelbarrow and inevitably, on us. Every day, one of our chores was to help shovel the stalls in the barn after my dad got home from work. On average, we’d have 13 horses and 6 dogs, which resulted in a manure pile as high and almost as wide as the barn. Grime was everywhere and never-ending.
My step-mom would continually have me clean and it was never good enough. Nothing was. So striving for perfection became my way of life. If I just tried a little harder or did a bit better, then she might care about me, love me, not hit me. It carried on into my adulthood. I constantly worked towards a goal and once I achieved it, I moved onto the next. The journey was not celebrated, I only focused on how I failed in other ways. I may have ran my own invitation business for 13 years, but I didn’t get invited on Oprah.
I’ve be working hard on my illustrations/collages and was thinking I was doing pretty well, until last week. I spotted a book at the library that made my self-confidence drop through the floor. ‘You Are Never Alone’ by Elin Kelsey, Artwork done by Soyeon Kim, is a completely visual, wondrous delight. The pictures are all from dioramas and are just incredible. Another book, ‘A Walk Through the Woods’ by Louise Greig and intricately hand-cut paper art was done by Helen Musselwhite, and is also completely gorgeous. How do I even compete with these books?
Arden snapped me out of it. She gave me a pep talk that surprisingly seemed more like being reprimanded by an elderly school marm. She was so spirited, the librarian came over to make sure everything was okay. My daughter has received enough encouragement that she has an abundance to share. I don’t push for unrealistic expectations, just her best. When Cam loses his mind over drawing something he doesn’t consider perfect, I show him how to change it into something else. Markers and crayons are not forgiving, but the imagination is.
So, with my husband and my kids cheering me on, I push forward. It’s easy to get it in my head that I’m not good enough. That none of us are. That if we just try harder we could be loved, be great, have the perfect life. But a lot of time and energy can be wasted on getting it just so. It steals joy. It can be debilitating if you let it. The important thing to remember is that perfection isn’t real, it’s contrived. It’s a marketing tool to sell products. It’s behind-the-scenes manipulation. As a human person, all you can do is your very best and try to enjoy the ride.
