How many times have you started a new project and after a few days, a few weeks, a few months you get discouraged because it’s not moving as fast as you want or it’s not as successful as you had hoped?
Been there, done that?
Yup, I think we all have at some point – whether it’s a personal project, developing your career, or building a new business. We start out with huge enthusiasm and expectation, but as we strive for success, we often focus on what’s going wrong rather than what’s going right, what’s not yet done properly rather than what is.
Instead of celebrating that email of appreciation from your boss, you’re lamenting the fact that you haven’t been promoted yet. Instead of jumping for joy when you bring in a new client for your biz, you worry about needing more clients. Instead of high-fiving your personal trainer because you did 100 sit-ups for the first time ever, you shrug and say, “Yeah, but it should be 150.”
Because things aren’t living up to your idea of perfect, you feel deflated.
Stop already! If you’re constantly chasing perfect you’re going to drive yourself (and everyone around you) nuts, because what is perfect anyway? It’s always going to be a moving target.
Not only that, but you’re going to hold yourself back from making further progress.
In those famous words of Voltaire, “Don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good.” (Okay, he said it in French…but, I’m not trying to be perfect here, so I’ll run with the English version – see how that works? ;-))
Seriously, tho – start focusing on the positive and the progress you’ve made. Here are three simple ways to do just that.
- Look back over time and write down all the things you’ve learned and done since you first started. Make sure you have plenty of paper handy because I assure you the list will be long!
- Every evening, write down 3 successes or wins you had that day. These don’t have to be big wins (I landed my dream job!), although you can certainly include those when they happen. More likely on a daily basis they’ll be smaller wins (I connected with 5 new people at a networking event). You see, it’s important to acknowledge all of these successes – big or small – so that you train yourself to look for the positive and the progress.
- When you have the inevitable setbacks, failures, mess-ups, don’t wallow in them. Learn the lesson and move on. Understand what went wrong and figure out how to do things differently next time. And as you do that, realize this too is progress. For without that latest screw-up you wouldn’t have the new knowledge and wisdom you just acquired.
So forget about getting it all perfect and instead give yourself kudos for progress.
Because the bottom line is this: Over time, those small, consistent steps of progress add up to major leaps in success!
Is the need to be perfect holding you back? Are you more focused on what’s not yet happened rather than all the progress you’ve made? Share your comments below or on my Facebook page.
Alex 🙂 xo
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