I recently took one of those silly personality tests you can find on Facebook. Well it turns out I’m a perfectionist! No really???!!! It was one of those tests that actually were spot on. And right around that time, an incident of serendipity occurred, a friend posted a TED talk on girls/females and perfectionism. See https://www.ted.com/talks/reshma_saujani_teach_girls_bravery_not_perfection?language=en&_lrsc=b5f5e5dc-80a5-44ed-87da-df32dd48e2e7&soc=twitterelevate. The bottom line of the talk is that girls have been socialized to be perfect, not to be brave. The speaker has helped girls overcome their perfectionism by teaching them how to code.
It was eye-opening. As a girl, tomboy and daredevil as I always thought I was, I am a perfectionist at heart. I thought I was brave, and I was about certain things. But not about some of the most important things. Perfectionism has cost me dearly in life. For one thing, it has meant I have not written the books and articles I have in me to write. Perfectionism has been a form of silencing my voice and the power of my words and I wonder how many other women’s voices have been silenced due to wanting to be a good girl/woman and to be perfect before attempting anything too risky or too daring.
Well, I have realized recently, after years of living, years of work experience in various sectors and disciplines, years of living and working abroad, years of doing research for various degrees and after having been invited to publish my MPhil Thesis, which I never did due to, you guessed it, perfectionism, I am going to get busy and start writing the books and articles that are in me. At heart I am a writer, a writer who doesn’t write which is crazy. It doesn’t have to be perfect! Men write, publish and present all the time in an authoritative, knowing voice, even when they don’t necessarily know every single thing about which they’re writing or speaking. I know of quite a few of these men and they pontificate quite confidently about all kinds of things. So stay tuned world for my book which I just started working on today. I don’t know if it will get published, but it certainly won’t get published if I never start writing it! And if it doesn’t get published I will blog it then or self-publish on Kindle or something. But I am going to fill the void of the silence. I am not going to be silenced by perfectionism any longer.
If I wait until it’s perfect, the world is deprived of my voice, my perspective, my words. I deprive myself of the power that is in me to make a difference in this crazy old world if I am effectively silent. If I don’t share the thoughts and perspectives I have, they’ll never be put out there. There will be nothing but a deafening silence. Similarly for so many women and girls out there. And not just women and girls but all kinds of people from all walks of life and backgrounds. I wonder how many people are being silenced by what they have to contribute to the world, whether it’s writing or painting or playing a musical instrument or a sport, because they’re too afraid of not being able to do it perfectly.
I encourage all of you out there to listen to the TED talk and then to get busy. And remember, baby steps. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Perfectionism isn’t overcome in one day, but as one of my favorite authors Susan Jeffers once said, “Feel the fear and do it anyway!”