Stop being a "Perfectionist"!

So you call yourself a perfectionist, hey?

This is probably one of the most common reasons people give when they are procrastinating on something - blaming that it's not yet good enough, finished or perfect.

Can you relate? Have you used this as an excuse to not finish something, or worse yet, not ever start it because you already assume that I will never be perfect, so "why bother"?

I'd like to put two ideas to you:

1. You aren't really a perfectionist - but you are using this strategy to delay (procrastinate), because there is something about that activity, task or project that you are not comfortable with. In other words you are afraid - which is ok and normal.

2. You might be a perfectionist, but haven't really realized how that label (self-imposed or not) is holding you back from being great. Remember, Perfect is the enemy of good, and and good is generally all you need to move ahead in life. Striving for perfect is a never-ending endeavour, because it never exists in all aspects of life, so you end up jumping from one area of your life to another, never satisfied and never finished and enjoying the progress and achievements.

So where to from here? Can we agree that perfectionism isn't really useful, for whatever reason you use it, it is NOT serving your purpose.

What if instead of chasing Perfection, you ran a strategy of chasing and looking for Progress?

That is looking for nudging things along towards the deadline, one step at a time, without worrying what the end result looks like too much from the start.

Try the following: Treat yourself as a hired freelancer, somebody you paid your own money to finish this task/project/activity, by a given date, to fit a given project brief and you only have 2 revisions at the end, after that you accept the project as final and submit or move on to the next thing on your table.

In other words, you create both a sense of urgency by putting a deadline to each revision and final acceptance, and also a mindset shift by creating accountability, to yourself.

Try it on and let me know how you go!