I wish I could say that I haven’t written blogposts over the last few months because I was busy traveling to exotic destinations where I was too busy or didn’t have internet access.
The truth is that I didn’t write because I had writer’s block. For me, writer’s block stems from a perfectionistic mindset in writing; a notion that I always need to write something really superb and flawless. And since perfectionistic thinking is often “Go Big or Go Home”, I wrote a bunch of drafts but didn’t publish any of them.
What changed for me? Well, I did some reflecting on what it was really about. Spoke to others about it and got support. Read about perfectionism, specifically with writing. And I started reassuring myself that I just needed to write something that was good enough.
And here I am.
Perfectionistic thinking comes up in therapy all the time. Our judgement of ourselves. Of others. Of life. And while perfectionistic thinking may seem like a motivation to try hard, it rarely results in satisfaction. If life isn’t perfect, and people aren’t perfect, how will our expectations be met? Exactly. They won’t.
Imagine what we could accomplish if we weren’t scared of starting or finishing something; if perfection wasn’t on the table, and good enough could actually feel good enough.
I’d bet that if that were the case, we’d be taking more risks and enjoying more accomplishments. And we’d enjoy those accomplishments not because they were perfect. But because they reflected our capacity to thrive with our talents, our ability to truly let it in, and giving ourselves permission to celebrate good enough.