This is the pumpkin pie I made for Friendsgiving this year.
As I was placing the decorative letters, I knew I was in trouble when I got to the “N.” The overlapping “S” on the right pumpkin, and the spacing between the “F” and the left pumpkin nearly drove me to toss the pie in the trash and start over.
When I lifted the soft cutouts to fix the decorations, they were already melting into the hot surface of the pie. The pie skin broke. The cutout ripped and mushed. Each of my attempts to make the pie perfect only broke down the structure of the very thing I wanted to perfect.
As I stressed and fretted and judged myself for my imperfect pie, I had a moment of clarity. And thankfully, I could laugh at the irony of the metaphor this pie was for my struggle with perfectionism.
The more I try to be perfect, and the more I try to make my output perfect (whether it's creative work, professional work, culinary experiments, etc.), the more wear and tear I place on myself and the further from “perfect” I get.
Around the same time as Friendsgiving, I was preparing to go to a writing workshop in early December. My perfectionism was in overdrive. I wanted to impress my mentors and bring pages that were perfect, but recent feedback indicated they needed work. Trouble was, I didn't know how to fix the pages, and the story likely needed a full rewrite.
I panicked.
But I didn't keep my panic to myself. I shared my dilemma with my writer friends; how could I bring pages that were anything but perfect to a workshop where I wanted to impress?
I wasn’t prepared for what they told me.
To paraphrase: Don't rewrite anything. Bring the story as it is because your best is enough. The purpose of the workshop isn’t to have perfect pages. The purpose is to learn from others and revise. Nothing more, nothing less.
My best is enough.
What a concept!
Logically, what my friends were saying about the purpose of the workshop made sense. So, I challenged myself to adopt this mantra, even if I didn't fully believe my “best” was enough. I brought my pages as they were, and after the first two critique sessions (out of four), I decided to give on-the-fly revision a try. Like clockwork, I hated everything I wrote. My pages read like a Frankenstein of all the feedback swirling in my brain.
I panicked.
I was afraid that if I brought my revision attempt to the third critique session, my mentor and peers would see I wasn't good enough. I was afraid they would think my story premise was great, but I wasn't good enough to write it. As I debated bringing my revision to the group, I thought back to the mantra.
My best is enough.
I did the scary thing and brought the revised pages. And again, as the feedback I received from that session swirled in my head that night, I was convinced my next revision attempt would surely prove to my final critique group that I was a fraud. My revised pages were more Frankensteined than before! I wasn't even sure they were coherent! As before, I debated bringing my revision to the group, and thought back to the mantra.
My best is enough.
But this time, I didn't think about the mantra in relation to my pages. I thought about it in relation to myself. Who did I want the critique group to see? How did I want to show up? I wanted my final critique group to see someone willing to put in the hard work. I wanted them to see someone who wasn't afraid to try a revision, even if it didn't work out. I wanted them to see someone who cared, just like I wanted to show my friends that I cared through my Friendsgiving pumpkin pie. I wanted to show that I’m someone who puts her heart into her stories and characters and every word, even if the words on the page or the pie aren’t perfect.
Because I am enough. I was enough starting from the moment I came screaming into this world. And if I'm enough, then my best is enough, too.
The kicker to all of this is that perfection is limiting. We like to think that if we can achieve perfection, then the world is our oyster. But if we don’t take the risk, or do the thing we want to do until we, or our output, is perfect, then we’ll never actually do the thing we want, or go after the dreams we have. Why? Because perfection doesn’t exist. And if we spend time chasing something that doesn’t exist, what we’re really doing is limiting ourselves from opportunities and growth.
Another culinary adventure - reindeer truffles! None quite turned out the way I imagined, making it a great way to challenge myself to adopt the concept of “my best is enough.”
If I only allowed myself to bring a perfect pie to Friendsgiving, I wouldn’t have brought any pie. If I only allowed myself to bring perfect pages to the workshop, I wouldn’t have brought any pages. I would have missed out on sharing a beloved family recipe with my friends, and I would have missed out on an opportunity to strengthen a story that’s so dear to my heart.
Chasing perfection is limiting (and it doesn’t exist).
I almost ended this post with the results. Did my friends like the pie? Did the final critique group like my revised pages? But I realized my results-oriented mindset and my perfectionism fuel each other. If I ended this post with how things turned out, I would only be feeding the beast I’m looking to soothe.
Instead, I’ll say that my pie and my pages were the best I could do at the time, and that next time, my best will look a little different. Because the beauty is, “my best” will evolve. It will improve. From each opportunity “my best” gets, it will learn and gain confidence.
And, best of all, so will I.