Perfection vs. imperfection. I tell myself that as my weaknesses and imperfections as a person, mother, and family improve, then I’ll be perfectly happy. I tell myself that once perfection is obtained, I will be a happy, content, and calm person. I tell myself that when there are things that aren’t matching up with what I consider “perfect”, then I have failed.
This perfection for oneself, one’s family, one’s home, one’s abilities, one’s children is rapidly debilitating women and, more importantly, mothers. Many of you that I have talked to carry the same burden.
After aiming so high with too many things in life, sometimes I begin to only see the failures and imperfections, always longing that that perfect day will come and honestly believing that that is when I will be perfectly content with myself and others. Life is beginning to teach me otherwise. That day will never come, so I must either choose peace and happiness in my imperfect state, or keep reaching for something that only brings disappointment and guilt.
There is a long list that I have (and many of you have shared yours with me), of things that we expect to be perfect in (or believe we should be perfect in because of others) and only drag ourselves over the grate when we’re not there. Let’s see, it isn’t very hard to come up with a list:
- a perfect manicured yard and bountiful garden
- a consistently tidied house by always willing children
- a beautiful, healthy, warm meal every single day
- a perfectly flowing routine or schedule that isn’t ever affected by interruptions
- a patient and loving mother who is always understanding and speaks to her children with a gentle tone
- a properly dressed woman who has salon-styled hair first thing in the morning
- a woman who seamlessly organizes her day so absolutely everything is accomplished and in order to simply lounge with a book every night
- a woman who doesn’t forget appointments, always plans ahead, and gives birthday cards to the mail man
- a woman who hosts extraordinary parties where everything goes smoothly and she is totally at ease
- a mother who can give all of her children everything they need in every moment
- a perfectly fit woman that looks just as good as the most recent magazine cover
- well dressed children with combed hair, matching shoes, prepared every morning to perfection…
Must I continue? I think you get the idea. So many books, blogs, magazines, movies, and shows tell me that I’m supposed to do it all and do it perfectly. I’m somehow supposed to do everything well and beautifully. That imperfection, failure, and mistakes aren’t acceptable. Well, expecting perfection in my home with four children along my side everyday isn’t even possible.
Why is it that we get caught in this idea that we must try to prove that we’ve got it all down? The more I try to “have it all down” in every aspect of my life I become uncontent, judgmental of others, constantly comparing, never reaching outward, and always hollow. Never able to please anyone, especially myself.
My approach to life now is to try my best for me, not anyone else, and find happiness right now with who I am. I am beautiful, with my imperfections and weaknesses. I can tell you how hard that is when everything around me shouts that I am not enough. Oh course, this is killing a woman’s identity, confidence, and love for herself. Of course, this is keeping us from doing great, bold things because we are trying to keep up with a so-called perfect image.
Well, I’ve had enough and I want to take a stand. I want you to take a stand against the ideal, photoshoped woman that has it all, as well. If each of us combats this disease we can be incredible. If we each stop looking around us for direction and approval and start looking in the mirror, we will conquer this. And guess what? We will start a revolution and the world will change, one person, one home, one community at a time.
I want your feedback this morning. Where do you struggle? How will you take a stand and regain your power, strength, and individuality? Let’s begin this revolution together…
the sleepy time gal
Thanks for posting this. I wasn’t going to leave a comment, because I thought I was the first to comment, which intimidated me. What if I say the wrong thing? What if I sound stupid? What if I make a grammatical error? But then I realized that this is the exact spirit of the post. Stop being so hard on myself. So what? I’m not perfect! It’s okay. Just say whatever is on my heart. It will be fine.
So here i am posting, not caring if it is perfect or correct. This is my first step in starting this revolution! I’m in!
Thanks so much for being bold. It IS so hard to live every moment without wondering if you’re doing it all right. Keep it up today!
I genuinely thought when i saw this – oh well i’m not a perfectionist, this isn’t relevant to me, until I got to the list, and I found myself nodding along to each point.
We blog our successes because we want them to be seen – to be noticed, particularly as mothers, particularly when we feel isolated at home with small children. But the collective affect is that no one else gets anything wrong, or gets tired, the whole ‘I don’t know how you do it!’ And so when we are tired, or low, or stumble in our confidence we feel like we’re the only one.
Thank you. I needed that reminder.
It is amazing to see how this idea of being perfect affects many people. If we can’t get a grip of it, how will it affect our children?
It seems that you don’t need me to email you anything. Looks like you got the concept down!
Love you
Thanks for posting this. It makes me feel ALOT better to know that I’m not the only mother/wife with daily struggles in life. I too try to hold the “perfect” standard only to realize that their is no such thing as perfect, and our weaknesses only make us stronger.
Have a great day!!
No one is alone in this. I see how many young girls are beginning to feel it in our society. Trying to look the part of perfection. I want my girls to grow up confident in their uniqueness, setting goals that they want, not what they think people expect of them.
Thanks for writing.
[...] Shiffler at The Sleepytime Gal, wrote today about perfection – This perfection for oneself, one’s family, one’s home, one’s abilities, one’s children is [...]
oh…. this post speaks to me and yet i’ve got no time to write this second because i’m in the middle of defrosting soup for a dinner i didn’t cook, showering my children -well, at least one of them!- and taking a quick peek at blog-land instead of picking up around my pseudo tornado hit house before i run out the door to my gym class!!!! but i’ll take a stand with you because, yes, we’ve got serious pressures on us to be perfect and i am with you in this quest to embrace imperfection and love it!
i’vetotally been thinkingonthis thelast few days.
caseinpoint. my space bar is all screwed up.
my first declaration against perfectionism…don’t worry about that dang ole space bar.
it’sannoyingthough!
guesswhat? We got a letterfromgirlswhogotour backpacks today!
So excitingandfun!Whatathrill!
WOW,.. woow.. what a powerful post! I am so struggling with many things right now. BUT I know that many people struggle with things as well that to them, is a lot, but others have struggles too.
1. Trying to buy a house. WE have looked at SO MANY houses, put in 3 bids on 3 different homes and lost. I know that the lord has a plan for us I know that the right house is out there, but where and when.
2. I have been doing a medical transcription course online and at home which is very hard! I made a goal to complete a test every week but it has not happened yet.
3. I want to be a better photographer while my sister in law is also giving me assignments to complete every weekand I am trying but I keep doing things and not getting the rules right and it is making me MAD! I wanna be so good at it , I have books, and a good camera, and props and ideas but it is hard to get it all right.
4. I am making home made cards and I want to be good enough to sell them! So If you want to be on my mailing list email me and I will send you a link every time I make a new card. I wanna sell them but I feel that I am not good enough, but i keep trying. I also have a blog penneysformemories.blogspot.com but I get discouraged! I wanna be so good and really sell them!
5. I want to be a better mom, I wanna be that loving mom that reads to her kids, and not yell, and I yell a lot! I want my kids to want to spend time with me and want to call me the cool mom, but I struggle with yelling and saying NO a lot! and I want to be better.
6. I am trying to “homeschool” so to speak my kids so that they ( James going to kindergarten in Aug and Erin only 3 ) to be that best when it comes time for school cause I am teaching more at home. I have not been faithful to that for weeks now.
7. I hate this small apartment and i am ready to have a garage and a big house to call our own, low on gas money after driving around day after day and disappointment after disappointment but I should be grateful for what I have, but I am tried of calling this place home when I can fit 5 kids, 2 adults AND LOTS OF STUFF in it.
8. Trying to get Sean to not be nursing anymore and I am out of ideas cause last time I tried to make it dry up I got a infection and had to go to the hospital which lead to a BIG hospital bill and I had no insurance…
and on and on…..
So I am there with you!, I feel we need to pray some more! When the world knocked you to your knees what better time to pray!!.. So that is what I need to do. I also think that we need to back off of the problems reevaluate, read our scriptures, pray, pay our tithing, pray, go to our meetings, pray, and when we think we are done, pray some more!.. But most importantly listen to the promptings of the spirit.. So this is personal what I need to do.. But that it helps.
And forget the world for a bit and engulf yourself about the gospel and our family.
Thank you for this! I really needed to read this today. Especially with a son that has Aspereger’s syndrome, I feel like I have to overcompensate for that huge imperfection in our family. Let me clarify. Jon is perfect in his own right, but I feel as if I am constantly being watched because everyone we know is keenly aware of his disability. I feel like everything else has to be in perfect order because everyone expects it not to be since I have to “deal” with Jon. You could say I feel a need to balance out the difficulties In raising him with having everything else in perfect order. I really need to let go once in a while and not stress out about it all.
Awesome! I embrace my imperfections because I am the queen of rationalizations and unrealistic thinking. This is my latest mantra ” I accept and embrace that I am lazy”. Instead of using that as an excuse not to do anything, I use it as motivation to get organized so that my life is easier (one closet, one drawer, one small movement each day). My husband and I plot out different ways with our landscaping so that mowing the lawn is easier for example….this is my latest project, and I know it’s all just temporary anyways until the day I have so much money I can hire people to do what I don’t want to and just do the fun stuff.
I was just talking about this with my sister today. We are doing a fine job- all of us and are mostly too hard on ourselves. Thanks for the post.
I grew up with a Mom just like this. Super critical, and very much a perfectionist and controlling. After I became an adult I realized she was just trying to control her life and keep her family and marriage together. She is much better now I am happy to say. I find myself reverting sometimes to that since that is how I grew up, but I have to make a conscious decision not to, to be lazy, to always put people before things.
I learned a lot of things about being a lazy mother (i.e. a rested, non-cranky, patient mother) from La Leche League, and I lay a lot of my worries at God’s feet every night.
I’m a teacher and the summer feels like I have to play a giant game of catch-up on being super mom. I end of being so caught up in what I didn’t do and my huge “to-do” list that I can’t enjoy what we have done, or are doing at the moment. I hope this year is better. I definitely need to work on being happy with what I have and where I am in life. Content.
Thank you for for very well-timed post. It is so nice to see this huge cultural problem put into perspective!
[...] how we perceive reality and the power to become. I loved the comments and reaction from you about perfectionism last week. And I can’t stop getting the many conversations I’ve had with women over [...]
Oh goodness this is a beautiful, honest, and difficult post. Every day I feel as if this life isn’t enough. There isn’t enough. I’m not enough. I don’t know what it is that I am looking for, lack or need, but my perfectionism tells me that I will always feel this way until I can break through these rules and ideals that I surround myself with. Thank you for your real list – it made me laugh and cry and sigh – I’m so right there with you, and am trying very hard to let my shoulders down and embrace imperfection.
Knowledge wants to be free, just like these arclties!