Mike Monday

Inspiration On Demand

5 Ways to Stop Being a Perfectionist – #10 of 100

In my last post I explained why perfectionism is an advanced form of procrastination. But if you’re anything like me, you know this but still find yourself constantly perfecting but not completing.

Here’s five ways of building and maintaining creative momentum by avoiding that niggling urge to perfect.

1/ Treat everything as a draft

Think of everything as a draft, not the finished article. You’ll trick your brain into focussing on the big picture and not the details.
You don’t have to worry about the details now. You just have to finish this draft. Get it done. You can go back and perfect it later.

Because it’s only a draft, it’s not set in stone and you’ll finish it. At worst you’ll have something tangible to work on, but at best you’ll have it in the bag.

2/ Take a break

When you’ve completed your “draft” make sure you take a break. The longer the better.

Sleep on it if you can.

When you’re fresh go back to it and you’ll probably find that its not as awful as you thought.

(And it might even be done.)

3/ Rush it

Pick a creative task that should take an hour.

Set a timer for 30 minutes and attempt to complete it. Hold yourself to account here and just get through it. Even if you think it’s terrible.

Rushing it means you won’t have time to think and you might even release your inner creative genius.

4/ Multitask

Continue working while reading and replying to some emails, or reading some blog posts, or tidying your workspace. It’s amazing what you can come up with when you only have half a brain on it.

This is the opposite of what I’d usually recommend as you’re intentionally forcing yourself to lose focus. But if you find yourself getting lost in details try it occasionally and in short bursts.

5/ Play!

Take what you’re working on and mess with it. Change everything. Be ridiculous. Shock yourself. See how far you can push it away from what you were intending.

Have fun. Be stupid. Go wild.

You never know what inspiration you’ll find at the edges.

Are you a perfectionist? How do you stop yourself? Please share in the comments…

Are You a Perfectionist?

Some people say “I’m a perfectionist” with pride.

But the pursuit of perfection is just an advanced form of procrastination. Here’s 3 good reasons to stop trying to make it perfect.

You’ll never achieve it

How are you going to achieve perfection?

You won’t, it’s not possible.

So how will never being able to achieve what you’re striving for make you feel? Confidence is key to creation and your pursuit of perfection will kill it.

Perfection isn’t the same as good

Why assume that something perfect is better than something imperfect?

Our Western ideal of beauty and perfection probably comes from the Ancient Greeks. But this isn’t the only way to think.

The Japanese aesthetic of Wabi Sabi – beauty that is imperfect, impermanent and incomplete – makes much more sense to me than any ideal of perfection.

Failure equals growth

Success is 99% failure
– Soichiro Honda

A neverending quest for perfection has its roots in fear of failure.

But if you build your courage, you’ll learn to accept and expect failure as a natural and important part of the creative process.

Fail, fail and fail again. Because when you fail you learn.

A caveat

I’m not suggesting you want to immediately release a load of crap. And I’m assuming that you care about what you do and make deeply, and you always want to be your best.

But assuming this, forget about perfection. Because it is more honest, courageous and useful to your development to get on with it, finish it, and get it out the door.

Worry whether it’s any good later.