I am a perfectionist. Or rather, a recovering perfectionist. I say recovering because I still have some very perfectionistic tendencies that I have yet to overcome, but I am far less a perfectionist than I was 2 years ago, or even a year ago. I used to try to be perfect in every which way. I think I drove myself to insanity. No one on the outside could tell, because it was all in my head, but it was real. It caused me severe depression and anxiety, and made me feel like my life was so wrong. Through some medication and a lot of counseling (with professional counselors, and with God), I have been able to overcome these obstacles. I enjoy my life very much now, and here are some tips I have gathered for staying sane in this crazy, busy and perfectionist world.
1) Don't do more than you have to.
Ok, so this might sound lazy at first, but hear me out. So many times I think we try to go above and beyond in everything we do, and it wears us out. When we are worn out we can't even do the minimum of what we are required. For example, if you try to be the BEST wife, the BEST employee, the BEST cook, the BEST homemaker, the BEST mother, the BEST runner, the MOST FIT person around, the BEST student, the KINDEST person....you will slowly go insane. It is important to go above and beyond sometimes, and it is important to work hard, but that doesn't mean being the best all the time, it's just not worth it.
2) Minimize your To Do List
We all have To Do lists. Even if it's just in our heads, it's there. I used to be a To Do list FANATIC. I was always looking at, re-arranging, and writing down my To Do list. I quite literally drove myself crazy, I was obsessive about getting my To Do list done, and, it was never done. One day I realized that I was doing more harm than good with my To Do list, but I didn't know how to change what I was doing. Then, I did an update on my phone and it deleted my whole To Do list, it was gone, forever. Honestly it was an accident, and I was pretty devastated for about a day. Then, I realized I was a lot happier without my To Do list (at least my long, extensive, compulsive To Do list). I still keep a small planner handy, with a VERY short To Do list for each day. I try to keep it to a minimum, because otherwise I just feel too overwhelmed. There are some things that just don't need to go on my list. Don't get me wrong I still love to plan out my days and decide which day I will do laundry or go to the gym, etc., but I don't obsess over getting things done. I'm so glad that my To Do list got erased that one day, it quite literally changed my life!
3) Focus your time on People not Things
I learned this one the hard way, and I've had to re-learn it over and over again. People are more important than things. Things are physical objects as well as ideas or roles we have in our lives. If we put the people in our lives that we love first, things usually fall into place. Now, nothing's going to be perfect, but in 10 years you will remember spending quality time with your friends and family much more fondly than you will remember wasting your days away studying, or working or cleaning. These aren't bad things, but if we put "things" before our loved ones, are they really our loved ones? Is it more important to make sure the kitchen is spic n span, or to spend time with a child who is experiencing difficulty and just needs some love? In the long run, people will bring us joy and satisfaction, while things will not. If we put people before the things in our lives, we truly will be much happier.
I really hope this helps someone out there. I sat down to write a blog article and had nothing in mind. I started typing and what you see here is what came out. So, if you're reading this, I hope you take these ideas to heart, and I hope they help to improve your life as they have mine.
