Doing good enough

     When thinking of starting this blog post, I asked myself if it’s really necessary to write about it since there is a lot of information out there regarding this topic from psychologists/researchers/coaches/creators/etc who emphasize that: doing good enough is truly okay; it’s time to let go of perfectionism and unrealistic goals; you are good enough, always, even when you think “I didn’t do enough” because the standards are too high and a lot of the time, even impossible. But then I remembered that other people have made me feel like my creations aren’t good enough, have imposed their perfectionist way of doing things onto my stuff, have given me advice on what they thought is good enough, have criticised my work because it didn’t come close to their level, etc. And I think we need another reminder because, even though there’s a ton of information about this subject, there’s also a continuous stream of posts/articles/videos of the “perfect life/creation/partner/body/vacation” that keep appearing on social media/magazines/TV/in the chats with our friends and there are times when the standards are being pushed even further so that means we also need a continuous stream of “good enough” talks/reels/blog posts/pictures/etc.  

      But the thing is that, it’s not so easy to change the perfectionist’s coat with the good enough’s one if you have linked being perfect with being loved/liked, if your belief is that you need to be the best in order to be satisfied or happy with your life/yourself, if you are a sensitive person and others’ criticism hurts you a lot so you would do whatever it takes to make it stop, if you live with a perfectionist, if you keep ruminating about/absorbing “the perfect…” images you see all around. So, you have to be patient with yourself and do some work in order to make it easier to change the coats when you find yourself again in the perfectionist’s one.        

    What can you do to stop yourself from falling into the perfectionist’s trap when you’re bombarded with those “perfect…” messages? Well, first of all, let go of thinking that you need to stop falling into it because that’s the perfectionist’s talk. Instead accept that, once in a while, we might all ask for perfection from ourselves or our work/creations. And this is okay because I believe that: the want of things to be perfect doesn’t go away completely; we often do it because of the need to control things, especially since we live in an uncertain world; it takes time to go from being a total perfectionist to an occasional one. Secondly, you have to be kind to yourself when you do fall into the trap since avoiding it always and forever it’s pretty much impossible. Thirdly, give yourself the permission to be human, to mess up, to make mistakes, to fail, to get things wrong, to screw up, to fall. These things are inevitable and are in our job description as human beings. Fourthly, take baby steps, like: letting go of a little bit of control; not asking perfection from yourself in too many areas and instead choosing some of them where you change your way of doing things to good enough; finally refusing to adhere to other people’s standards and begin making your own; interacting less with those who are making you feel like you aren’t/what you do isn’t good enough; stop listening to that little voice that says “You will never be good enough”/”You need to be perfect to be loved or liked/”Your creation isn’t good enough so you can’t share it”/”You have to make it perfect to count”/etc; not caring anymore about the fact that some persons think your creations aren’t good enough and continuing to create them because they are good enough for you, and that’s all that matters.  

     It’s not easy but it is absolutely necessary if you want to live life on your own terms, be happier, or create a life you can fall in love with. Giving yourself the gift of “good enough” is liberating, it’s an act of self-love, it is mandatory if you want more peace and joy in your life. As a sensitive person and a former people pleaser, I acknowledge that it takes time and work and patience, but when you finally release the need of perfection so other people love you/like your creation or to not be considered lazy or to fit in (since that’s what a lot of people ask for/how they live their life), you gain self-validation, you feel happier, you don’t feel hurt anymore when others don’t like what you create, you just enjoy the process of creation and focus on how you want things to look like, you make your own standards instead of following those of another person. 

     Next, I’m gonna share a real example of mine in the hope that it might help you when someone else thinks your creation isn’t good enough or when you ask for perfection from yourself. 

      I made my blog public on a Saturday, after 7 hours of working on it that day, and there was a thing it wasn’t quite right with the design but I didn’t know exactly how to change it and I really wanted to put the blog out there in the world, even though I didn’t like something about it. The thing is, I did guide myself after the Tyler Moore’s youtube video, but being a rebellious and “I do things my way” kind of a person, I haven’t watched the whole tutorial and I didn’t even follow through all the instructions since I wanted some things to be a bit different, like having a menu that displayed all my blog posts not the classic one in the “about-contact-blog” format. And that’s why I didn’t know how to change what was bothering me until after launching of my blog. So, although I initially thought the blog wasn’t quite ready to be made public and that maybe I should keep working on it to make it better, I decided that it was good enough for now so I didn’t wait until I had made all the corrections I wanted or believed they needed to be done. I decided “good enough” to be my standard, not perfect. Shortly after I posted the first articles, I had a discussion with a friend in which she told me her opinion about my website and what I should change about it, a discussion that led to me wondering if my blog posts are really good enough to be read by other people. Why? Because she said things like: ”You make too many jokes” (I’m funny so of course my blog would reflect that 🤪); ”Your articles are too long (I’ve read shorter and longer blog posts)”; ”I wanted to read about… on this article, but that was missing from it”; “you should choose one language in which to write your articles (I had some blog posts written in my own language, I didn’t write all of them in english); ”I like to see only personalised photos on a website” (I have a few pictures uploaded from copyright free websites because I haven’t had an idea about a photo that worked well to those articles and I didn’t want to wait until I could convey an appropriate image, since the thought of waiting for that to happen did cross my mind but again I chose “good enough”); ”Sometimes it seemed like I was reading from your journal, the writing was too messy and it was like you didn’t even read what you wrote before posting it” (well, it is a personal blog, not a travel one, so of course sometimes it is messy and chaotic because that’s what was on my mind/how my brain worked then or that’s how I felt when writing, and yes, at times my articles do look like are being taken out from my journal because that was the purpose, to write in that unfiltered way and raw state of mind); ”There are too many details”; etc. So at one point after hearing those things and more, I just asked her “Does my blog reflect me?” and she said “Yes, it’s totally you”. After my friend responded to my question I told her that it means I have achieved my goal, because my intention truly was to have a personal blog that reflects who I am and to write blog posts about the topics that I’m passionate about, in my own way, even though they might seem messy or chaotic or too complicated for some people. And, at another one moment in our discussion she said the blog should look in a certain way (comparing it with a professional working out website) and then added “but I’m sure it won’t remain the same and that you will continue to work on it” and since I already knew I had some things I wanted to change on the interface of my website, I said “Yes, of course. It looks like this for now because I plan to work on it and make it better”. Only that, I didn’t change almost anything about my blog’s interface, after giving some more thought, because I realized that the design was good enough for me, so I changed just that thing that bothered me from the start, after learning from Tyler Moore how to do it. The thing is, I chose to focus on my writing because it’s a personal blog, not a travel one, it’s not a Pinterest account or a professional blog, so the look of my website is good enough for me, and that is really what matters the most. And, sometimes I even post articles that are good enough because I don’t want to spend more time or energy on trying to make them better. And that’s my prerogative and my choice. 

     Did it hurt my friend telling me all those things and more? Yes, it did and as a sensitive person, it affected me a lot. And, I felt disappointment because I believe she imposed her opinion onto me when she said “I wanted to read about… on this article, but that was missing from it”, it wasn’t missing since it is my personal blog and this means that I write whatever I want, and when she said some other stuff. I also felt disappointed because she compared my blog with another website, which wasn’t even a personal blog, that looked better in her opinion and said mine was “too much/messy”. But, that led to me being more aware when giving my own opinion to people and adapting the question I asked her “Does my blog reflect me?” to “What do you want?”/”How do you see this situation?”/etc, so as not to impose my way of thinking/doing or my opinions onto others. And as a rebellious person, it annoyed me a bit when she said to me what I should do, instead of asking how I see things or if I’m satisfied with the result or why I thought of doing it that way. Also, I’m a firm believer that we musn’t give advice when it comes to things we don’t have much knowledge of or about things we don’t do ourselves, and that we can’t say to people “you should this or that”, especially when it’s not something we’re familiar with from our own experience. But, as a human being who is interested in growth and personal development, I reread my articles because she said that they aren’t cohesive, that I jump from topic to topic, that there are linguistic errors in them. And yes, I have done some mistakes in my writing and I will continue to do them and not just because english isn’t my first language, and not because I don’t proofread my blog posts since I do that more than twice actually, but because I’m an imperfect human being, one who will always mess up, one with ADHD, one who isn’t be perfect and doesn’t even try to be, one for whom doing good enough is okay, and enough. But I also think that my articles are cohesive and yes, sometimes I do write complicated sentences because this is who I am, and yes, at times I go into too many details, but again, that’s how my brain works so my writing does reflect that. The thing is, I took those comments way too hard since I grew up in a critique-ridden environment, where making mistakes was front upon and even corporally punished, and of course it mattered not only what my friend said and how she said it, but it also mattered the fact that I have ADHD so I feel hurt when criticized by the closest people in my life. Also, other people wouldn’t have been affected by those words, but because of my own history and my way of being, I was, even though my friend didn’t have bad intentions and didn’t want to hurt me. But after some time I realized that it was a great lesson for me, even though it was hard at the moment, that it actually was a gift because I now know how to receive feedback and more importantly, to no let a negative one affect me too much. And, I ended up being more resilient and stronger because I no longer let myself be hurt for too long by other people’s criticism or different opinion, and I move over it faster. Yes, I still feel it in the moment even though I thought I didn’t anymore, but a more recent comment from a friend showed me that it still hurts, although not as much as before because of the work I’ve done to change that. And I guess it will always affect me a bit, okay, a bit more, because I have ADHD so  RSD (Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria) kicks in when I receive criticism or I feel rejected in some way. 

      So, my conclusion and thoughts after thinking for a while about that discussion with my friend are: as long as I’ve achieved my goal and I am happy with the end result it doesn’t matter what others think about my creations; more often than not, I choose to do good enough instead of perfect; another person’s opinion isn’t more important than my own; I am self-assured, self-validated so I no longer expect external validation or assurance; people are entitled to their own opinion but that doesn’t mean I should take it into account; I create in my own, personal and imperfect way, regardless of the outside standards; what others might think about my creations isn’t my problem and it doesn’t affect me as much as before. 

      Also, I think that our creations should be a reflection of us, should look and feel like ourselves, should be our own self-expression, messy and imperfect as we are. I believe what others like shouldn’t have any weight when we are creating something that is totally us, when we try to express how we feel and think, when we try to open a small door to our inner world so that we share a bit about what’s inside of it. So, if your creation looks “too much/messy/complicated” to others, that is okay and normal since we are so different, and, for some people it will be just right or even great. And please remember that, our standards are different so a perfectionist might ask for perfection from you but since good enough is your standard in that area, you are happy and satisfied with the end result, which is in my opinion the thing to strive for/what matters the most. And other really important things to remember are: some people don’t like seeing someone else expressing themselves fully through their life or their creations, exactly how they are, because they themselves aren’t doing that; letting go of perfection does make us happier and kinder to ourselves; there are persons who are more rational or rigid in their views so don’t like a messy/disorganized creation; there are tons of “perfect ideas” in the minds of a lot of people and if you’ve created something that’s “only good enough” be proud of yourself, you’ve done what others only think of doing; a lot of human beings find some stuff cringe or too much because they have fixed ideas about how things should look like; others’ opinion is just that, an opinion, not a fact to be believed as the truth; doing good enough is better than doing nothing, it is a gift in this perfection-driven world we live in, it is the norm, not the exception. 

Something to think about:

1. What’s your opinion about doing good enough? Your opinion, not that of another person, just seek your own answer and not listen to what you’ve been taught to believe about this or to what others might think about it.
2. Do you live your life by your own standards? Or are you following those imposed on you by society or other people?
3. Think about the areas where you can change from doing perfect to good enough, it might help you improve your mental health, happiness level and even your life.

P.S. Doing good enough is enough. A lot of the time, doing things good enough is the difference between transforming your ideas into reality or them living in a perfect fantasy in your own mind. One of the meanings of life is to create and to express yourself through your art/creations, not to do a perfect project/work of art/job/etc.

Fun fact: This turned out to be my longest blog post. 🤣