I had a very life-changing conversation with a dear friend the other day about this and would like to share what I have found. I anticipate any thoughts that you, my dear friends and family, may have in response.
I am a perfectionist.
As a perfectionist, it is very difficult to live in this world, as I have heard from many of my fellow self-designated "perfectionists" :). No matter how good you do or are, someone always looks or just is, better than you in any given area! You have continual expectations (how the day is going to go, how the house should look, how your child is going to act, what you are going to say to a person, how you should look, how others should behave, etc. etc., etc!) So, I have always sought for external validations that I am "succeeding" or even getting close: a clean house, good grades and high honors, perfect children, perfect body, and perfect Saint. And then, when I don’t measure up, as I eventually fail to with those standards, I go the opposite extreme of just not doing it, not trying, pretending that I just don’t care enough to try. (For instance, I am a virtually computer-illiterate person who comes from a family of literal computer geniuses–I decided when I was young that I was not good at it, and, bullheadedly have remained so since! ;)
As you can guess, this kind of living creates a lot of stress! A life of constant comparison and constant self-judgment is not an easy one...yet some deep inner part of me feels that there is only one standard I can compare myself to for "perfection" and, like in my "Big Toe" parable, it happens to be the sum total of the "perfection" I see in everyone around me: physically, emotionally, and mentally in the roles of mother, Christian, house-keeper, woman, friend, and scholar, to name a few. I imagine there are a few others out there like me...
However, over the years, I have learned a few things about "perfection".
First of all, it does not look the same for everyone. My body, while far from perfect as it is (, would not be perfect at "size 2"...I would be undernourished and emaciated. Also, for my family to be "perfect", I currently see that as healthy, clean, spiritually aware, and full of love towards each other, which cannot be attained by rigid conformity to a sterile house, rigorous exercise schedule, and continual study and practice of how to be nice in a filthy, disease-ridden house, with poor nutrition habits. (As a plaque I gave to my sister-in-law said: "This house is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy!") Each of us have to find a balance of what is important in our lives, or, inevitably, if we are too focused on one area, the others will sicken. Unfortunately, this is "uncomparable" territory!
Secondly, there is only one person who knows what your individual perfection is supposed to look like: your personal God. As we trust in Him, ask Him prayerfully what is truly needful each day, He will guide us, and we must trust that He knows what He is talking about. So, when kneeling down for inspiration at the beginning of the day, we can do as Elder Eyring from my church counseled:
"A morning prayer and an early search in the scriptures can set the course for a day. We can know which task, of all those we might choose, matters most to God and therefore to us...such a prayer is always answered if we ask and ponder with childlike submission, ready to act without delay to perform even the most humble service...all would be possible for the humblest of us. The temptation to delay will come from two feelings...one to be complacent...and the other to feel overwhelmed."Lovingly pray: "Please let me serve this day. It doesn’t matter to me how few things I may be able to do...Just let me know what I can do. I will obey this day. I know I can, with thy help."Hard as things seem today, they will be better in the next day if you choose to serve the Lord this day with your whole heart...when your burdens become too heavy, the Lord, whom you have served, will carry what you cannot. He knows how. He prepared long ago. He suffered your infirmities and your sorrows when He was in the flesh so He would know how to succor you.When you go to sleep: "Well done, thou good and faithful servant; thou hast been faithful over a few things" (Ensign, May 2007)
And then, we act on it. We follow the spirit, our gleanings of God's will. We find those things, over time, that are truly important, and then, if we have time to clean up more, study a little more, etc., that is just a bonus! I have found, that, for me personally, the inspiration generally involves something about relationships or service, forgiveness or repenting...and it is typically a small and simple way to do exactly that. That is how my personal perfection looks and I trust Him.
Perhaps, the why of why I trust Him is key, and was the biggest thing I learned from my conversation about perfection with my friend the other day–
I realized that my personal concept of "perfection" is why I have always felt uncomfortable and confused when people tell me, "How can you blame yourself for what happened with your son, Isaak. It was just an accident!"
Of course it was an accident. Of course I didn’t do it on purpose. However, now, thanks to that conversation, I have the words to describe why I still felt that I needed the Atonement of Jesus Christ so desperately.
My friend’s husband has been fired from his job. He is an amazing professional with an incomparable sales profile and resume, and felt like this was an attack to his respectability, especially since his previous employers had been close personal friends of the family. To a man, to not only challenge his respectability but take away the means by which he supports those he loves is an incredible blow. And, to a perfectionist man, the blow is a strike to who he is. You have removed every external verification that he is succeeding in one of his primal roles.
As a perfectionist myself, I jumped through "all the hoops" through the years, seeking good grades, good college, awards, recognitions, as milestones on my road to perfection. When I became a mother, I took care of my children the best I could, continually subconsciously and consciously comparing myself to other mothers as a measure of my "success". I would watch an amazing mother and feel inferior; watch one for failings (shallow, I know) and then feel better about myself. For years, with most external measurements (barring the occasional melt-down in the supermarket) I was doing alright.
Then, one day, I was unable to keep my child alive. I had failed to measure up on the most fundamental level...my child had died. I was the one who was driving; I was the one responsible for his safety; and he had died. Not by intent, of course, but because I wasn’t perfect enough to prevent it from happening. I mean, come on! Even the worst mothers normally provide an environment with enough nutrition and roof over their heads to allow for life! It was then that I was brutally confronted with the fact that I had failed in something that was primal to my nature, much like my friend’s husband.
The months of self-hatred and loathing that followed were not healthy, I’m sure. The years previous where I had been selfishly "depressed", preoccupied with my own happiness and perfection, were a pathetic comparison to what I was feeling then. I realized that, if one truly does not like oneself, one will not seek other’s pity, time, or compassion...they are more than you feel like you deserve or merit. Even to remove myself from the picture was unacceptable, considering that the loss and anguish that would be suffered by those close to me if I should take such a step. Again...it would be selfish. Living through these months of self-denial and lack of acceptance of who I was purged much of the selfish depression that had plagued me for years. I realized that if I truly did not like myself, I wouldn’t make myself a burden to those around me. And, having torn away the facade of who I was and who I thought I was, I felt almost self-less, living for those around me. Remarkably, part of the miracle was that I was healed by doing so. By literally losing myself in reaching out to others, I was healed in a pure and remarkable way.
Not only that, having lost all my external tokens of success, I was able to face the fact that I, on my own, would never "jump through enough hoops", achieve enough accolades to earn salvation, earn that "perfection" that I saw at the end of my road. I knew that I had to depend completely upon my Savior, Jesus Christ, for perfection in a very real way. I had deluded myself for years that if I just worked hard enough, I could work my way back to heaven by presenting a lengthy list of all of the things I had accomplished. I knew, now, how empty those external measurements were...for if they were true, there was no hope for me, a perfectionist.
I still remember the day in March a year after my son died, when I knelt in prayer, unable to try to reason through the "whys" or "why nots" anymore. I simply said, "Here I am. I don’t know if You can love me, but here I am" I cannot describe the peace I felt, contrasted so vividly with the torment I was wracked with before that. It was truly the peace that surpasseth understanding mentioned in my canon of scriptures. My God accepted me on a fundamental level for who I was. He was looking at the state of my soul, not the list of my achievements.
So now, it is easier to let go of the fluff, the extras. When I start getting caught up again in trying to prove myself to others, I look at that picture of my son and realize how empty that is. Then I can more easily prayerfully look at my day and do what needs to be done, and I find peace...I find joy, inexplicable joy, for I know that once again, and daily, my God accepts me and my proverbial widow’s mite. I am enough.
