Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done

by Jon Acuff

This is the first lie that perfectionism tells you about goals: Quit if it isn’t perfect.

developing tolerance for imperfection is the key factor in turning chronic starters into consistent finishers.

Imperfection is fast, and when it arrives we usually quit. That’s why the day after perfect is so important. This is the make-or-break day for every goal. This is the day after you skipped the jog. This is the day after you failed to get up early. This is the day after you decided the serving size for a whole box of Krispy Kreme Doughnuts is one. The day after perfect is what separates finishers from starters.

The problem is that perfectionism magnifies your mistakes and minimizes your progress.

The harder you try to be perfect, the less likely you’ll accomplish your goals.

We’ve now bumped into the second lie of perfectionism: Your goal should be bigger.

That’s a fun sentiment, and the bigger the goal, the bigger the initial rush we get from imagining it, but today I’m going to dare you to do the opposite. In fact, I want you to cut your goal in half. I’m not telling you to do less—doing this will actually help you do more.

Because we tend to set goals that are foolishly optimistic. Scientists call this “planning fallacy,” a concept first studied by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. They described this problem as “a phenomenon in which predictions about how much time will be needed to complete a future task display an optimism bias and underestimate the time needed.”

The options are: 1. Quit the goal because it was too big, or 2. Cut it in half and finish it.

Those two approaches, cutting the goal in half or doubling the timeline, can be applied to most goals.

Perfectionism will tell you it’s now or never, forever obsessed with the idea that if you don’t finish it now, you never will. Most New Year’s resolutions are actually January resolutions. We’re so eager to have an amazing month that we exhaust ourselves in the first three weeks of the year and never make it to February. That’s just perfectionism trying to puppet-master your timeline.

This idea definitely goes against every goal-setting bit of wisdom you’ve ever heard. I know that, but remember, we’re trying to do two things here: 1. Finish. 2. Beat perfectionism.

Actions: Think back to other goals you’ve attempted. Were they too big? Write down what happened. Write down a number associated with your goal. (It’s difficult to cut a feeling in half.) Will you read ten books? Declutter four rooms? Lose twenty pounds? Make five thousand dollars? Decide whether you can cut your goal in half or double the timeline. Share your goal with someone you trust and ask him if it’s too extreme. If you’re uncomfortable with cutting your goal in half, spend a few minutes answering the question “What’s the worst that could happen?”

The only way to accomplish a new goal is to feed it your most valuable resource: time. And what we never like to admit is that you don’t just give time to something, you take it from something else. To be good at one thing you have to be bad at something else. Perfectionism’s third lie is: You can do it all. I’m here to tell you that you can’t.

Attempt more than is humanly possible and fail. Choose what to bomb and succeed at a goal that matters.

Shonda said no to shame, and she could do that because she had a strategy. She had decided what she could bomb, and perfectionism couldn’t torment her about missing the gym anymore.

In his book Two Awesome Hours, Josh Davis calls this strategic incompetence. Strategic incompetence is the act of deciding ahead of time that you don’t care about your yard. It’s admitting you don’t have time to do everything and something will deliberately go by the wayside during this season of your life.

Strategic incompetence for me meant making peace with those four things. Will they change over time? Maybe. I might be all about Snapchat in the future. For now, though, in order for me to go all in on things that matter, I had to choose to suck at a few that don’t. In some cases, choosing to ignore something will force you to come up with a system. Most people, including me, can’t fully retire from e-mail. It matters too much and represents one of the most common ways people communicate.

Actions: Make a list of three things you could bomb during your goal. Use the red light, green light approach. For time drains you can’t bomb, figure out a way you could simplify them. Write down, in a secret place no one will see, three relationships you might need to pause in order to finish your goal.

The reason we pursue goals we don’t like is twofold: We think goals have to be miserable. We believe perfectionism when it tells us that fun goals don’t count.

I thought that progress had to feel that way. I thought fun didn’t count. That’s a lie. Fun not only counts, but it’s necessary if you want to beat perfectionism and get to the finish.

When you study goal setting you look at a variety of statistical factors, but the two most interesting are: (1) satisfaction, and (2) performance success. One speaks to how you felt about the process and the second focuses on what you actually got done.

Study after study has confirmed this. The common myth about high-level performance is that it must be grueling, painful, and difficult. But the scientists researching elite swimmers found to their surprise that even at the 5:30 A.M. practices, the swimmers “were lively, laughing, talking, enjoying themselves.” They continued, “It is incorrect to believe that top athletes suffer great sacrifices to achieve their goals. Often, they don’t see what they do as sacrificial at all. They like it.”

But keep in mind that the shortcut isn’t “find something fun”; the shortcut is “make it fun if you want it done.” There’s action involved in that. You have to do the work of making it fun. How? Ask this question: “How could this goal be more fun?”

They are buffeted by unseen waves, like how their parents handled money growing up, the health of their romantic relationships, what they care about the most, and a million other factors, but in a decade of helping people he’s found that client motivations fall into two rough categories: Reward motivation Fear motivation

For some people, once the reward is detailed and clear, some sort of motivational engine is fired up. Once the path to retirement or paying for college is laid out, they run down it with vigor. People who are motivated by a reward have what psychologists call an approach motivation.

For others, a reward doesn’t move the needle at all. The pretty picture of the future is too far off, too boring, or too safe.

They are not motivated by what could be if they acted; they are driven by what won’t be if they don’t.

This is called avoidance motivation. People motivated this way are not trying to achieve a desired outcome, they are trying to prevent an undesired outcome.

Failing to recognize what is “fun” or motivating is a big part of why goals often fail.

When you use the wrong form of motivation, you’ll never get the car to move.

Instead, pick which form of motivation you need the most and then add it to as many parts of the project as possible.

As you choose between fear and a reward, please know that perfectionism will tell you that you don’t need either. Real winners don’t need motivation. They just do their job. They don’t need rewards or punishments, no carrots or sticks. They just put their nose to the grindstone. A reward is cheating. You’re better than that. The hard work is its own reward.

The more fun you add to your goal, be it in the form of fear or reward, the more likely you’ll actually finish.

Working hard for something we don’t care about is called stress. Working hard for something we love is called passion. —Simon Sinek

Perfectionism must hate this book right now. Let’s review the three actions I’ve recommended: Cut your goal in half. Choose what you’ll bomb. Make it fun if you want it done.

Actions: On a scale of 1 to 10, how fun is the goal you might be working on? Decide whether you’re motivated by fear or by reward. Fun is often weird. (See balsam candle.) To flesh it out a little, finish this sentence: “This is weird, but I find ____________fun.” Pick three small points of fun you can add to your goal.

Everyone has heard the phrase “paralysis by analysis.” You can get stuck drawing a perfect plan and never actually get work done if you’re not careful. But more than just analysis, perfectionism offers us two distinct distractions: Hiding places Noble obstacles A hiding place is an activity you focus on instead of your goal. A noble obstacle is a virtuous-sounding reason for not working toward a finish. Both are toxic to your ability to finish.

The goal of those questions is to get a few hiding places identified. Once you identify the hiding places, the logical thing is to take the time, energy, and money you are spending in the hiding place and spend them on the activities that help you meet your goals.

If you identify one of these hiding places, you should stop going there with your time.

Energy is a little more difficult to measure, but is just as expensive as time.

Finally, stop spending money on your hiding places. If you can’t afford to go to the gym you really like because you don’t have the money, expensive vacations might be a hiding place.

The flip side is that some things aren’t distractions, they’re commitments.

Even more important, it’s time to turn hiding-place activities into tools that will help you make it to the finish.

As anyone who has struggled with hiding places knows, one of the best ways to fall in love with a new goal is to just try to finish an old one. You are never more creative for new ideas than when you are almost done with an old one.

But what if that’s not a distraction but a great idea? What if that new thing that came out of seemingly nowhere is actually something you should definitely do? What if that’s the best idea you’ve ever had and it got stirred up by all your hard work?

I don’t know if it is, but I know that ignoring it is the wrong approach.

Fighting it is a waste of time and energy. Instead, embrace it. Admit that it might indeed be awesome. And then make exploring it a condition of finishing the goal you are working on.

Want to create a reward you really love? When new ideas or new goals get shiny, put them at the finish line. Don’t try to grow callous to the shiny objects; if anything, let them gleam. Let them be brighter than the noonday sun. Just make sure they point the way to the finish line.

Line your finish line with the dream goals you’re currently using as hiding places and then watch how fast you’ll run toward it.