What is perfection? Here is the way I see it:

Perfection is about your technique. Perfection is not about who you are as a person.

When you perfect your technique, it means that you are investing time and effort to hone and master your craft, which is simply the method in which you do something, in order to reach your desired result. It is a point A to point B process, and it is measurable and trackable.

As you perfect your technique, you earn top dollar and prestige in your field. Congrats! Well deserved.

But when you aim to be a perfect person, that means you are trying to live up to someone else’s ideal image of who you should be. It has nothing to do with any methodical, measurable process. There is no point A to point B — because you can conform to someone else’s expectation of perfection today, and when that person changes his or her mind tomorrow, you’ll have to change your entire being as well.

When you are trying to live up to someone else’s expectations, you’re no longer boss of yourself. You’ll lose self–respect and inner authority, and also drain yourself of joy. Don’t do it.

The twist

The twist about perfection is that society has continually changed its meaning to be about something else.

It doesn’t matter if we’re living in the era of Downton Abbey or if it’s the age of Facebook and Twitter. We’ve come to think of perfection as not the absence of mistakes. We’ve turned it into concealing truth, and generating and managing appearances.

If you think about it, most women don’t fret about not being able to bake the perfect apple pie — it’s never about the pie and it’s not about the technique of baking. If it were, that would be a methodical and measurable process to fix and hone. Simple.

What women worry about is failing at creating the appearance of being skilled at motherhood or in being a woman.

If I can’t bake the perfect pie, what will the neighbors think?

When you perfect your technique, you’ll come to do your work with lots of positive pride. Think about Mr. Carson in Downton Abbey, who displays good self–admiration over his spotless wine glasses and perfectly positioned dinner settings.

But when you try to perfect who you are as a person, you’ll be approaching your entire life from a place of shame.

The healthy way to look at perfection

The next time you criticize yourself for not being perfect, think about whether you’re frustrated over the actual technique of what you’re doing, or if it’s about failing to generate the right appearances.

If it’s about appearances, that is a self–destructive mindset that you’ve got to let go of.

If you beat yourself up for not being perfect, you’re going to be the same person that’s gonna have a huge inflated ego and tramples over others when you do become perfect. In being that way, you’re always going to make it about you, rather than about those you love and serve.

Perfection, to me, means doing the very best you can with the current level of knowledge, awareness and understanding that you have. So, what you are creating today may very well be the most perfect level you can achieve right now — awesome!

Don’t worry about being perfect. Rather, focus on evolving.

Why? Because evolving is productive, measurable, methodical and trackable.

This is especially true in business, because everything in business evolves over time, whether that is your skill set, your relationships, sales and marketing efforts and your level of income.

Evolving is about being in the journey. Perfection is about getting to a destination.

Trust that when you grow and know better, you will do better. But for today, it’s perfect the way it is with the current level of knowledge, awareness and understanding that you have.

It’s good to go.

Hi, I’m Ana Coeur

I teach entrepreneurs how to create their business straight from their soul. I offer a complete Intuitive Business Suite to help you create, design, write and sell all from your intuition. Here’s the services you can take advantage of to empower your business: Intuitive Web & Brand Design, Intuitive Copywriting and Intuitive Selling. If there’s anything I can help you with, I would love to hear about it! You may email me at anaintuitivepicture.com

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