“Practice makes perfect.” You probably heard that expression hundreds of times growing up. It sounds like an admirable goal, but the pressure to be perfect creates stress and anxiety, with little payback. Today, I challenge you to say no to perfectionism and embrace a new expression: “Done is better than perfect!”

My Journey Toward Imperfection

Let me tell you a little secret: I am a recovering perfectionist!

For years, the desire to go the extra mile and make things “just right” created so much stress in my life. I spent most of my life beating myself up over any mistake. It was the same for other people’s mistakes. I had little tolerance for anything that wasn’t perfect.

My mindset shift started when I was working late one night trying to meet a deadline. I was in tears because I wasn’t happy with the work that I was doing when a co-worker dropped into my office.

My colleague said to me, “You’re putting this stress on yourself because you’re not meeting your own standard for perfection. You could submit this right now, and no-one will notice that it’s not as perfect as you wanted it to be. Sometimes you have to accept that you did the best you could in the time you had available.”

She was right! Since that day, I’ve worked hard to adopt the philosophy that done is better than perfect.

Perfectionism Makes You Worse, Not Better

Having high standards and wanting to produce good work aren’t necessarily bad things. But that relentless drive for perfection ultimately makes you perform more poorly. You get stuck in a cycle of tweaking and redoing to fix that last five per cent, or even one per cent. That time could be better spent moving on to your next important task.

I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for. Perfection is God’s business.

Michael J. Fox

I’m not suggesting you abandon your high standards and accept shoddy work as the new gold standard. Remember, though, that perfectionism means you’ll never be satisfied no matter how great things are. There’s a lot of good—and even excellent—work out there that isn’t perfect.

First Steps to Overcoming Perfectionism

Set a goal for this week to start letting go of unrealistic expectations of perfection. Here are three steps you can take to make that happen.  

Practise Forgiving Yourself…and Others

So, you made a mistake! Or someone else did. It’s not the end of the world.

A first step is to keep mistakes in perspective. If it’s something as simple as a typo on a slide or blog post, let it go. Chances are no-one even noticed. If it’s a bigger thing, ask how you can learn from the mistake. Then, take the learnings and move on. Dwelling on it won’t undo the error.

Give yourself permission to be human.

Stop Comparing Yourself to Others

The pressure to be perfect often comes out of what we see from others.

When my daughters were growing up, I often told them there will always be someone smarter, better-looking and more successful and that’s okay. Remind yourself that the external image people project doesn’t always reflect reality. And you don’t know how much time and effort they put into projecting that perfect image to the outside world.

You do you and let the rest of the world do its thing.

Decide That Done and Good are Better Than Perfect

Finally, write these two sentences down on a sticky note and post them where you’ll see them often.

• Done is better than perfect.
• Good is better than perfect

When you’re tempted to spend even five minutes tweaking minor details, doing one last read through, or polishing something that’s already pretty shiny, stop! If what you have is already good enough, move on to your next big task.

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On that note, I’m resisting the urge to give this post one last read through. Because good is better than perfect…any day of the week.

Do you struggle with perfectionism? Tell me your tips to overcome it below.

Learn more about me in my bio and on my personal blog at BoomerEcoCrusader.com. You can also find me on Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest.