Don't Let Perfection Destroy The Fun

The desire to be perfect can be paralyzing but also make us unkindly critical of others and ourselves.    We see it in our daily lives but especially on social media.   Why do we not enjoy the learning process or allow others to engage in the learning process without judgement?    For me, I know much of my critical nature stems from my own insecurities.   

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Transcript

Hello, this is Melissa Libby and you are listening to Mom Treading Water. 

So many of us, especially myself, have this desire for perfectionism. You see it on social media, which is part of the reason I had started this podcast. But sometimes our own desire to be perfect, or even expecting it of others, makes us critical. And why do we not enjoy that learning process? Why do we not enjoy the rehearsal process. 

But before we get into that, if this is your first time joining us, thank you and welcome to mom treading water. If you are returning to Mom Treading Water, thank you very much.  I'm not able to express my gratitude enough. Please don't forget to subscribe.  And if you are enjoying this podcast, please share with your family and friends as well as join our Facebook group,  Mom Treading Water. Alright, let's get down to business. 

I know for myself, sometimes my desire to be perfect, turns into me making unbelievable criticism and judgment on other people. I am absolutely a criticizing monster and I think I even take it to another level of my own self- criticism. I think as a culture, we look down on mistakes as something negative, like a mortal sin, as opposed to being a learning process,  steps in becoming a better person becoming better at a skill, whatever it may be. 

And there's no doubt that we've all been guilty of criticizing other people taking that a step way beyond constructive criticism. I know I definitely need to ask myself more, am I just being critical or is there a benefit to my criticism? Is it a constructive criticism? Am I providing feedback where someone can learn and develop? Or is it just to be nitpicky? And with myself, it's the exact same thing. Am I just beating myself up? Or am I evaluating and looking at something to trying to do better? This podcast is an absolute prime example of that. 

If you notice, in last week's episode, there was a transcript. And I'm reading through it, I noticed how many times I say, and thank you, and again, and just all these repetitive terms. Okay, that was constructive. That was constructive criticism of myself to try to be better and how I present myself, there is growth. Hopefully, I guess we will see when read this week's transcript, I'll figure it out.

But last week, the episode was about raising non jerks. I was commenting about how I can be a real jerk sometimes, or I was unaware of my jerky behavior. But specifically, I was talking about how to apologize how to forgive, especially because I do struggle with forgiveness with certain people in my life. And I also turn to a lot of you to ask you, how do you forgive? How do you forgive when people are not asking that forgiveness. 

But there's no doubt that my critical nature is based so much on my own insecurities, and finding now, the more secure I become in myself, the less critical I am of myself, meaning in a way that I'm beating myself up not critical in terms of trying to learn or be better, but I have to catch myself. It's a very hard habit to break, and it doesn't come easily.

 And the criticism that I have towards others, is a truly constructive in terms of trying to make that person better themselves, or is it me and my own ego? Am I being a righteous jerk? I think of constructive criticism is when you're trying to teach you're trying to help someone do better. You're doing it in a nonjudgmental way. And I think it's so easy to do this with your own children. Like for example, my kids cook with me a lot. And I think I've mentioned that, and there were a few things I insist on. One is cleanliness, they need to thoroughly wash their hands and my daughter needs to put her hair back. They can't put their spoon in the mouth and then put it back into the bowl everyone will be eating out of they can put their fingers in the bowl. You know, very simplistic things… that's constructive. And little ones are just not always the cleanest people.  I know my kids are always playing in the yard ,  the dirt, hands go in mouths. I look at that as trying to teach them hygiene. As in the past I've said before, I try to base on my criteria of three things. Health Safety and respect. I consider all those things that I request touching every single one of those categories. 

But here is an example of when I was totally out of line, acting like a complete, crazy person, critical jerk. My husband and I were still dating and he was just starting to meet my family. We were having them over for a cookout at my house. We were having hamburgers and cheeseburgers, other standard stuff. He was kind enough to cook on the grill. He was bringing the food in, and the hamburgers and cheeseburgers touched.  Yes, I know. It is very mortifying. Really? How ridiculous was I acting, I acted like he was Charles Manson, that he had committed a crime. When my focus truly should have been on “Thank you for helping,  thank you for caring enough to work so hard for me to have a nice gathering with my family.”  And oddly enough, this guy still married me. He definitely should have been more critical of me. 

But now let's fast forward about 10 years later, my husband James and I are married.  We have kids, as many of you know. And we decided to let them have ramen noodles as a little bit of a treat lunch. Now my husband does not enjoy cooking , that is definitely not his forte. But he wanted to do that for them. So he boils the water he puts the noodles in and then he puts the little packet of sodium, also known as the flavor in at the same time as the noodles. Catastrophic! Okay, so it was not catastrophic. What you're really supposed to do, according to the directions is take it off the heat, put the little packet in, and then mix it up for about a minute. But I did not criticize I just kept to myself. Because in my head, I thought, so what? Who cares. It's a 40 cent pack of ramen noodles that kids were excited to have it. He was helping and I was so grateful that he was doing that. So we can change, we can make progress. Because 10 years ago, it would have just been like the hamburger cheeseburger touching instant. 

I do struggle sometimes with my children, identifying what's constructive criticism or what is just criticism, because I want something done a certain way. But it gets to a point if you are constantly criticizing your kids, if they never do anything, right? You're just beating their self-esteem down. Everything doesn't have to be perfect. Everything is never going to be perfect. Yes, you need to work hard. Yes, you need to try to do things the right way. But if that desire, if that pressure for everything to be perfect, is going to destroy your self-esteem, discourage you from moving on to try something new. Is it really worth it? Like when my daughter who's four years old wants to help wash dishes? Or my son who is who is five years old, wants to make his bed a certain way? Is it exactly the way that I would do it? Of course not. I'm a grown adult. I'm in my 40s I've already learned how to do those skills. Why would I crush their confidence, their feelings of accomplishment? Just to be right. It's not like they're 25 and they don't know how to wash dishes or make their bed. They're learning. They are taking pride in those small victories.

It's something as adults, that maybe we need to try to do more, instead of beating ourselves up over the things that went wrong, acknowledge all the things that go right. And when we do find ourselves being critical, think about learning a new skill. Do you get it right on the first try? Most times I don't think people really do. I know for a fact I absolutely don't. Certain things take me forever to learn. 

Being involved in theater is a perfect example of that. It's been a little while, but I was involved with a lot of community theater. The one thing I truly loved most about theater was the rehearsal process. I enjoyed it way more than even the performances, because I loved the process of learning and developing. Most people don't get everything right on that first try. That's why you have rehearsal to get better at something. And you can't over criticize yourself. I know for me, when I'm not doing something, right. I overthink it. I criticize myself, beyond belief. I focus on that one little negative thing and then I can psychologically never get past it. The best directors I've ever worked with, don't do that. They don't criticize you. They don't put you down. They don't degrade you. They work with you. They help teach you , they talk through the process. They work with you on trying new things trying to experiment because I think the best direction To know that if you're yelling at you, if they're intimidating, you, you kind of freeze up, you're more than likely not going to get it right. And they are not going to get the best out of you that they know you can do. 

So if you find yourself in an instance, where you are criticizing your children think, am I providing true constructive criticism? Allowing them to have that learning process, the rehearsal process? So they learn to be better and celebrate those small victories? Or is it just being over critical? Because you want something done a certain way,  you want to be right? Learning needs to be fun. It needs to be engaging, it shouldn't be stressful, it shouldn't be overwhelming, it needs to be an opportunity to grow. 

This week, I'm challenging you. I'm challenging you to try something new. It doesn't need to be anything time consuming. It doesn't need to be an enormous gesture. But when you're learning something new, instead of wanting or expecting perfection on the first try, allow the learning process called the rehearsal process.

Don't criticize yourself for the things that don't go right. That are not perfect, but focus on the things that you did correctly. Celebrate that you are trying something new, and you celebrate all the things that that you did do that worked out. And if that one thing that worked out is that you tried something new and that you challenged yourself. That is a victory worth celebrating.

Please enjoy your week of learning and rehearsing. I would love for you to report this back to our Facebook group, Mom Treading Water and I'll include that link in the in the notes. Please, be sure to invite friends and family who you think might enjoy this podcast as well as our Facebook group. Don't forget to subscribe so you get notified when new episodes are available, which is typically every Monday. Thank you again for listening. Be kind to yourself, be kind to others. Thank you for sharing your time with me. Now go have fun and enjoy your week.