I’ve been asked to speak about being comfortable with imperfection.
That one has often been hard for me because I want everything just so. One of my coping mechanisms was to have everything lined up just so and everything in perfection, including myself.
Being a perfectionist was a survival and coping mechanism for growing up. So it’s a familiar topic. I think I approach it from two viewpoints. One is imperfection and perfection of what? As I’ve grown and understood that all of our mind is just belief systems that you can choose to keep or not to keep, Then perfection is something that has to do with a certain belief system of what perfection is. It can be artistic perfection, it can be physical perfection, but it’s perfection to some belief system.
And by being willing to let go of the belief system, releasing it, then I can choose what is perfection, what isn’t perfection? The Native Americans always, in there making their rugs, my understanding is that they never made them perfectly because only God made things perfectly.
And I remember that sometimes, that the imperfection makes it human made, and maybe it’s beautiful. When I look at nature and look at the way that there is chaotic perfection in nature, both mathematically and otherwise, I see beauty and the fact that it’s imperfect makes it even more beautiful.
The other part about the imperfection is it’s based on an emotion. Emotions hold it in. So I want to have perfection or want to experience perfection because if I don’t, I have a certain emotion. And the emotion that usually underlies the experience of imperfection for me is fear. And as I release my fear in my life about everything that I’m releasing on, imperfection becomes less important because I’m not as fearful in general. Imperfection doesn’t matter.
If I were a concert pianist, imperfection would have a different meaning. But I’m sure the concert pianist, by bringing what they bring to their art or any art like that where there’s a supposed way to do it, you bring who you are and that makes your stamp on it. And it’s perfectly done by you which would be different than some other concert pianist, perfectly done by them.
So when you’re feeling imperfection, just notice the belief systems and notice the emotions. And release both, on the belief systems and the emotions.
Could you let that drive go? Would you let it go? When? What’s underneath that belief system? Could you let that go? Would you? When?
And obviously with everything, open to it? Can you open to that wanting to be perfect? And what’s the energy underneath the wanting to be perfect? What is it that you’re actually wanting? And could you open to that wanting? Wanting can lead you to be perfect. Can lead you to become the best pianist.
So it’s opening to and releasing, either way, the belief systems and the emotions that would drive you to be, the suffering from imperfection. If the driven, being driven to perfection is creating something wonderful, go for it!
It’s just the suffering of feeling that you’re driven to improve, to be perfect. And when it comes up, just notice when it comes up, you know, when I screw up, oh shit, I screwed up. I wasn’t perfect. And then I explore what that means in terms of what that screw up means. And open to the possibility that maybe that’s part of the perfection.
And of course, there’s the bigger level where it’s all perfect and everything has perfection in it by definition of it being what it is. And that is always true, though sometimes {phone rings}
I love that my phone is ringing when I am doing a release, so I get to release now on having forgotten to turn the phone off, that I wasn’t perfect with the setup, is great. But maybe it’s perfect.
So open to the emotions, the belief systems, and the bigger picture that it’s all perfect exactly as it is.
Thank you.