From Stuck to Unstoppable: Confronting Perfectionism and Fear

I was speaking with a friend this week about something she was really stuck on – deciding what she wanted in her business by the end of 10 years. She actually had a good idea – she talked about it a lot. But when it came down to putting it on paper and executing it, she was stuck.

It turned out that what she was stuck on was her own perfectionism: she wanted some way of knowing ahead of time that everything she did to realize her work dream would work out flawlessly.

My friend knows life isn’t like that. She knew she’d need to try things and then make changes until it all worked. She knew that some things don’t work for other reasons and that her 10-year plan needed to account for that possibility. She knew that Thomas Edison was said to have failed 100 times before succeeding.

She knew all of that. What really helped was talking about it, because then that big fear of failure got a lot smaller and more manage able.

Sometimes, perfectionism is a way of hiding our fear of failure, or fear of success, from ourselves. The only way out of that stalemate is to begin.

From Goethe: Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. 

Quote of the Week

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

― John Steinbeck

Perfection is killing your progress

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Maryanne Nicholls is a Registered Psychotherapist.  To find out more, gain access to her weekly newsletter, meditations and programs, sign up at www.thejoyofliving.co .