Perfect

Perfect.  Seven letters.  Two syllables.  It's amazing that such a small word can, at turns, inspire dread and pride.  Perfection is difficult to attain so when, for an elusive moment it seems to be reached, the high can be as good as a drug.  Unfortunately...the attainment of perfection is not always a satisfying endeavor.  In fact, more often than not the outcome is a letdown.  Perfecting a task requires either an extremely high threshold for attention to detail, lots of practice, or both.  It certainly requires at least one.  I think striving for perfection can be an extremely admirable undertaking.  Working hard and being dedicated is a great way to find success in life.  And honestly, if you aren't going to do your best in every undertaking then what's the point?  There gets to be a point there where the quest for perfection veers from worthwhile to unhealthy or, at the very least, unproductive.  A couple days ago I posted on my Facebook: "Don't let perfect be the enemy of good enough."  It's also one of my personal commandments.  Just because something isn't perfect doesn't mean that you haven't given it your best and there's nothing wrong with that.

Unless you're like me (and I'm sure some of you are) and you think that unless you can achieve perfection in each and every think you attempt there's no point in trying.  This is a terrible quality of mine.  I'm ashamed to admit that I have pretty much have no ability to persevere.  This goes hand-in-hand with my other commandment: practice, practice, practice.  If I'm not good of something, I won't keep trying.  I'll just quit.  I would like to place more value in practicing and working to reach my goals, because I'm pretty sure that's what people do in Grown Up World if they want to get better at something.  I don't know if this has always been a trait of mine or if this is something that's happened as I've gotten older.  I can tell you that I have, uh, pretty much no hobbies.  Growing up I was good at school so I threw myself into schoolwork, and I was good at it.  As an adult I am (and I'm not remotely being facetious) good at cleaning my house and organizing and...that's about it.  In fact, it's almost a compulsion.  I can't stand for drawers or closets to be messy.  I can't stand to go to bed without the house being perfect.  As a consequence, I restrict the kids from going into a large portion of the house (although I think there's an element of practicality in that too) and spend at least an hour a night cleaning up, rather than cultivating a hobby.  These behaviors, especially cleaning in the evening, are good examples of letting perfect be the enemy of good enough.  Spending twenty minutes on picking up would probably be sufficient almost all the time; ninety minutes is probably overkill.  I have several things I would be interested in but when I try them I'm not a professional, or even in a lot of cases, very much good.  One of the things I'm trying to work on is to enjoy the process, instead of worrying about the outcome.  Practice, practice, practice so I get better at things.

I will probably continue to be obsessive-compulsive about the house though.  I'm already pretty good at that so why quit?