Present Over Perfect: Leaving Behind Frantic for a Simpler, More Soulful Way of Living

by Shauna Niequist

This journey has been about love, about worth, about God, about what it means to know him and be loved by him in a way that grounds and reorders everything.

Years ago, a wise friend told me that no one ever changes until the pain level gets high enough.

Now I know that the best thing I can offer to this world is not my force or energy, but a well-tended spirit, a wise and brave soul.

if someone gave you a completely blank calendar and a bank account as full as you wanted, what would you do?

Part of being an adult is taking responsibility for resting your body and your soul. And part of being an adult is learning to meet your own needs, because when it comes down to it, with a few exceptions, no one else is going to do it for you.

Which brings us, literally, to the heart of the conversation: the heart, the cavernous ache. Am I loved? Does someone see me? Do I matter? Am I safe?

You can make a drug—a way to anesthetize yourself—out of anything: working out, binge-watching TV, working, having sex, shopping, volunteering, cleaning, dieting. Any of those things can keep you from feeling pain for a while—that’s what drugs do. And, used like a drug, over time, shopping or TV or work or whatever will make you less and less able to connect to the things that matter, like your own heart and the people you love. That’s another thing drugs do: they isolate you.

As I unravel the many things that brought me to this crisis point, one is undeniably my own belief that hard work can solve anything, that pushing through is always the right thing, that rest and slowness are for weak people, not for high-capacity people like me.

What you need along the way: a sense of God’s deep, unconditional love, and a strong sense of your own purpose. Without those two, you’ll need from people what is only God’s to give, and you’ll give up on your larger purpose in order to fulfill smaller purposes or other people’s purposes.

Oh, the fear I’ve known, that I might reap the praise of strangers and end up on my own. All I’ve sung was a song. Maybe I was wrong.

The distance seems to almost always create space for another person, and then there’s a whole new level of pain and violation.

And when things are hard and painful and barbed at home, what a lovely thing it is to be loved at your work, right? What a lovely and dangerous thing.

“Everybody else likes me better than you three do.” That’s what you call a wake-up call. That’s a change-your-life, start-right-now moment.

It’s very hard to be loved and connected to the people in your home when you’re always bringing them your most exhausted self and resenting the fact that the scraps you’re giving them aren’t cutting it.

We get used to smiling, hugging, bantering, practicing good eye contact. And it’s easier than true, slow, awkward, painful connection with someone who sees all the worst parts of you. Your act is easy. Being with you, deeply with, is difficult.

It is better to be loved than admired.

It is better to be truly known and seen and taken care of by a small tribe than adored by strangers who think th...

And love happens over years, repetitive motions, staying, staying, staying. Showing up again. Coming clean again, being seen again. That’s how love is built.

It wasn’t a good time to talk about it, but that’s part of the problem—when you’ve created a life for yourself that doesn’t leave space for talking about life-changing decisions, you’re doing it wrong.

I needed to leave this old way of living—jamming things onto the calendar last minute, clearing away space to write and connect with my family, only to fill it up at the last minute with one more event, one more trip, one more conversation where I couldn’t figure out how to say no and so I said yes, crammed full of fear and building resentment.

In recent years, I started to sense that I was being run by something other than my own voice and calling, something other than God’s vision for my life. And I talked and talked about it, but unfortunately, mostly kept doing things the same old way—out of habit and fear and that crazy sense that just one more would be okay, now just one more, now just for him or her, for an old friend, to help someone out.

Sometimes brave looks more like staying when you want to leave, telling the truth when all you want to do is change the subject.

Sometimes obedience means climbing a mountain. Sometimes obedience means staying home.

But the rush to scramble up onto platforms, to cross oceans, to be heard and seen and known sometimes comes at a cost, and sometimes the most beautiful things we do are invisible, unsexy.

Brave is staying put when I’m addicted to rushing, forgiving myself when I want that familiar frisson of shame that I’ve become so used to using as a motivator. Brave is listening instead of talking. Brave is articulating my feelings, especially when the feelings are sad or scared or fragile instead of confident or happy or light.

Brave is walking away from the “strike while the iron’s hot” mentality that pervades our culture. Brave is being intentional about taking your marriage from “fine” to “can’t live without you.” Because fine is not fine at all. Fine is like a mesh sieve, enough space for all the important things to slip through, and all you’re left with is to-do lists and resentments.

It’s easier to be impressive to strangers than it is to be consistently k...

Sometimes being brave is being quiet. Being brave is getting off the drug of performance. For me, being brave is trusting that what my God is asking of me, what my family and community is asking from me, is totally different than what our culture says I should do. Sometimes, brave looks boring, and that’s totally, absolutely, okay.

And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good. —John Steinbeck

I could plunk myself down right in the middle of the mess and realize that the mess is actually my life, the only one I’ll ever get, the one I’m in danger of missing completely, waiting around for fantastic.

It’s about rejecting the myth that every day is a new opportunity to prove our worth, and about the truth that our worth is inherent, given by God, not earned by our hustling.

Perfect is brittle and unyielding, plastic, distant, more image than flesh. Perfect calls to mind stiffness, silicone, an aggressive and unimaginative relentlessness. Perfect and the hunt for it will ruin our lives—that’s for certain.

The ache for perfection keeps us isolated and exhausted—we keep people at arm’s length, if that, and we keep hustling, trying trying trying to reach some sort of ideal that never comes.

I’ve missed so much of my actual, human, beautiful, not-beautiful life trying to f...

I’m drawn to music that’s more earnest than tidy, art that’s more ragged than orderly, people who are just a touch more honest than is strictly appropriate for the situation. I’m finished hustling for perfect. It didn’t deliver what they told me it would.

If perfect is plastic, present is rich, loamy soil. It’s fresh bread, lumpy and warm. It’s real and tactile and something you can hold with both hands, something rich and warm. Present is a face bare of makeup, a sweater you’ve loved for a decade, a mug that reminds you of who you used to be. It’s the Bible with the battered cover, the journal filled with scribbled, secret dreams. It isn’t pretty, necessarily—it isn’t supposed to be.

Present is living with your feet firmly grounded in reality, pale and uncertain as it may seem. Present is choosing to believe that your own life is worth investing deeply in, instead of waiting for some rare miracle or fairy tale. Present means we understand that the here and now is sacred, sacramental, t...

Present over perfect living is real over image, connecting over comparing, meaning over mania, depth over artifice. Present over perfect living is the risky and revolutionary belief that the world God has created is beautiful and valuable on its own terms, and tha...

Perfect has nothing on truly, completely, wide-eyed, open-souled present.

I want to be right here and right now, that I am loved and known and that I don’t have to hustle or perform.

I’ve taken across the last several years to find the woman I used to be—she’s definitely nowhere near perfect, but I like her better, and I’m determined to find her again.

Nothing is neutral; nothing escapes them. The shame glasses I wear almost all the time mean that every story looks like shame to me.

We twist the sacred words to tell our own stories. We do it with Scripture; we do it in conversation. Whatever you’re looking for, you’ll find. If you’re looking for stories to affirm your deep belief in the goodness of humanity, you’ll find them. If you’re only seeking stories that say the world is nothing but evil, you’ll find them. And if every story you hear, every song you sing, every tale you tell is really a story about shame and about not being good enough, you’ll find it.

And this is what really undid me: it’s not a scolding at all. It’s a loving post-game analysis—hey, pal, what happened out there? How can we, together, help you stand? It’s so loving, so parental, so protective … why haven’t I ever seen it this way? Because I’m trained for shame, and I see it everywhere, even when there’s not a shred to be found.

What if all my life I’ve been trying to walk with a Jesus who reprimands me while I’m drowning and grabs me at the last second, rolling his eyes? No wonder I don’t tell him when I’m scared or fragile. Why would I?

They are the only things in all the world that have been entrusted entirely to me, and I stewarded them poorly, worshiping for a time at the altars of productivity, capability, busyness, distraction.

Be careful how much of yourself you give away, even with the best of intentions. There are things you cannot get back, things that God has not asked you to sacrifice.

Part of the crazy of it is that we don’t allow people to fall apart unless they’re massively successful.

I’m so thankful for blackberries and peonies and newborns and the smell of rosemary

we cling to these structures because we think they are what keep us safe—as if we’re bugs who need exoskeletons, shells outside of ourselves to protect us. But when you start to understand how strong you are, you realize that you don’t need a shell at all. The inside is strong and secure, and doesn’t need to be shielded by all those other things—performance, proving, busyness. There is nothing left to be shed, and at the center is strength, gratitude, Jesus.