Stop Waiting for Perfect
(Published through Ama La Vida's Words of Wisdom - 9/3/24)
“Waiting for perfect is never as smart as making progress.” – Seth Godin
Have you ever felt stuck because your inner perfectionist holds you back from making a meaningful change? Do you have a brilliant idea trapped in your head because you keep waiting for the right moment to strike?
Many of us are guilty of this, caught in the endless cycle of planning and preparing, only to find ourselves stuck at the starting line.
Although you know that progress, not perfection, is the key to unlocking our potential and creating new possibilities, you find it difficult to take the leap.
It’s important to understand that human brains are wired for survival, constantly scanning for threats and focusing on the negative. We are on autopilot and make unconscious judgments because our brains orchestrate actions and reactions based on their best guesses of the current situation.
This instinctual response often leads to fear of failure, the need for a foolproof plan, and the overwhelming desire for certainty.
But what if we could rewire our thinking, learn to redirect our attention, and consciously choose our focus? Acknowledge our fear without allowing it to control us. Embrace uncertainty and take that first step anyway.
The reality is there's no such thing as a perfect plan.
Success is often the result of grit, resilience, and consistent action.
Ditch perfectionism and do this instead:
Define your motivation: Articulating your motivation and its positive impact to reaffirm your intention and help you keep going.
Create a roadmap: Breaking down your desired outcome into achievable milestones so that your journey feels less daunting and every achieved milestone becomes convincing evidence that what you want is possible.
Set the right expectation: Remember that good things take time and patience to build, and the most critical part is to consistently move forward, even if you feel the progress is minuscule and slow.
The distance between where you are now and what you wish to accomplish can be shortened by one action at a time.
Get out of your headspace and get busy, as only the actual doing and trying will give you additional information, a better direction, and higher confidence.
Even if you make mistakes along the way, congratulate yourself for the expedited learning and trust that you are many steps closer to reaching your ideal result because of all your knowledge and resilience gained along the way.
