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January 9 - January 11, 2021
Implementation is the hardest part of personal growth, as we always have more on our wish list than we can obtain,
Perfectionism causes some of life’s worst mental problems because it makes life’s imperfections into bothersome, intimidating, and unsurpassable roadblocks.
Perfectionism is an excuse-generating machine. After setting a perfect standard, attempting to meet it seems futile. Such a standard can also be a response to underlying fears and doubts.
“I would rather die doing what I want to do than die in a nursing home bed somewhere watching TV for 15 hours a day, surrounded by other people waiting to die. To me, that is the scariest thing imaginable.” ~ Jon Morrow
It’s easier to change your mind and emotions by taking action than it is to change your actions by trying to think and feel differently.
Care less about results. Care more about putting in the work. Care less about problems. Care more about making progress despite them. Or if you must fix something, focus on the solution. Care less about what other people think. Care more about who you want to be and what you want to do. Care less about doing it right. Care more about doing it at all. Care less about failure. Care more about success. Care less about timing. Care more about the task.
We get stuck when we feel like life is never enough: there’s not enough time in the day; we didn’t get enough sleep; we didn’t do enough this morning; there’s not enough money; or we’re not good enough for [unlimited reasons].
Focus on the process. It’s the single best way to change your circumstances.
For mental freedom, be apathetic about your current circumstances and potential results. Instead, obsess over the process! When you focus on the process, you haven’t just lowered expectations, you’ve bypassed them altogether.
At some point, we must realize that no amount of guilt, remorse, and rumination can change what has already happened.
When you begin to ruminate on an event, give yourself 30 seconds to understand why you did what you did. You always act in your perceived best interest. Think about your motives in that moment. Admit you’re a flawed person. Once you’ve fully understood your “prior self” in that moment, you will not judge your actions as harshly
Accept the past as unchangeable. At your selected daily cue (time, location, or following another habitual activity), take a moment to reflect on and accept the finality of the past. This is good practice to develop a “present mindset.”
The key to building powerful confidence is to decide specifically what you can be confident about right now, and build from there.
Confident people don’t ask for permission.
Embarrassment’s function is to discourage us from doing things to cause more embarrassment, but that’s circular reasoning.
Embarrassment, though, has very little downside other than the discomfort itself of feeling embarrassed.
It’s only once you’re free to make your own choices that you’ll discover who you really are.
If you’re successful in the eyes of the world, remember that human accomplishments are only impressive because we are all flawed (otherwise, success would be ordinary).
If you think people expect perfection from you, take comfort in the fact that most people don’t care what you do.
“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” ~ Dr. Seuss
“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
Procrastination is not caused by laziness but by a combination of fear and overcomplicated objectives, which come from a perfectionistic mindset.
those who simplify and make success easier than failure are those who get into “success cycles.”
If I trip and fall forward, then I’ve still moved further than I would if I hadn’t taken a step. If an action—however small or flawed—helps you, then it’s good.
It isn’t lowering your standards, it’s redefining success as progress and raising your standards for consistency.
When you set a lofty goal, you cede control to your goal and lose autonomy.
Redefine success as progress, and success will become modular. You’ll get more frequent feelings of accomplishment and create a powerful foundation that can always be added to.
It’s only when you pull the trigger and say, “I’m going to work on
that you’re exposed to an entire wave of imperfection.
low confidence in your ability to produce good work for any reason.
Even though we all know it takes hard, “unpretty” work to do something meaningful, the perfection fantasy about our work and our lives can still persist because it’s an emotional desire (not a logical one).
Embracing imperfection in all phases of the process destroys excuses. It kills the fear of failure because it includes failure as part of the process: “I know this won’t go perfectly, but it will go.”
“Continued pleasures wear off; continued hardships lose their poignancy.”47 If you let any doubt stop you from acting, you will avoid living a meaningful life. But if you pursue the things you want as best you can, you’ll figure things out. Trial and error is the time-tested way to improve something.
Always be looking to terminate the deliberation phase ASAP with a commitment to one task (this is aided by low action standards and looking for a “good” choice instead of “the guaranteed best” choice).
What’s the worst thing that could happen? How likely is that to happen, and could I recover from it? What’s the best thing that could happen? How likely is that to happen, and how nice would that be? What’s most likely to happen?
Albert Einstein said, "It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer."
Life is not a one-way, single-lane road. It’s a sprawling, free-for-all field. If your goal is to get from point A to point B, the straight and obvious way does not have to be your path, and it may not be the best choice.
Part of imperfectionism is being kind to and patient with yourself.
“People call me a perfectionist, but I'm not. I'm a rightist. I do something until it's right, and then I move on to the next thing.” ~ James Cameron
focusing on the process guarantees better results, while focusing on results distracts you from the process needed to obtain them.
