Are you are a perfectionist?

“I’m not ready; I need so many things in place before I can even think of leaving my job, it’s such a big risk”. I vaguely remember hearing this somewhere and not because I felt the same, it just made me wonder.

Wonder about how it is that we as human beings tend to function, where comfort and security are prerequisites to a lot of our decisions as adults. It’s understandable to want to have things thought out, to pay attention to detail, but not at the cost of forsaking something before it's even begun.

As Human beings, our brains are programmed for safety and survival; for example, you may think a lot before going in for that job interview, you’ll play over a 100 scenarios in your head of what you should and shouldn’t say, but when you’re sitting there, your survival instincts kick in and take over, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. All in all, we have the potential to succeed and fail, we learn from both, and coincidentally, both involve making an attempt. This need for perfection before we try is just a form of eternal procrastination, there is never a perfect time, a perfect place or a perfect anything, it is not perfection that creates success, but working towards it, striving towards it that does.

The greatest athletes can never be perfect, but continuously working towards it do they achieve a level of greatness and gradually develop a consistency in their game. NFL hall of fame coach, Vince Lombardi said: “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection, we can catch excellence”. History is rife with examples of great men and women, who have worked passionately towards their dreams and goals, some for years, some for decades, what they all have in common is persistence, some started with an idea, while some started with a lot more, but they began somewhere.

Even authors and writers tend to struggle when trying to create the perfect story, the perfect plot, the perfect dialogue, eventually, even for them, it all comes down to the first word, the moment they put pen to paper and start, that’s when the story literally writes itself. There is always a need to put in place a plan of action, a to-do list, or a set of predefined objectives that lay the foundation for whatever it is that you wish to undertake.

It’s also important to keep in mind that success is not just a result of planning, but of execution too. It is only when executing do we truly understand the magnitude of possibilities that lay ahead of us, and only while executing are we afforded the opportunity to truly test everything we’re trying to achieve.

If you still feel the need to put together a near perfect plan, then a better approach would be to start with a flawed plan and use something Tim Ferris calls ‘Red teaming’, where you put together everything you have for your idea/venture, and present to a team whose only objective is to rip it to pieces. Your worst naysayer, that teacher who always criticized, the friend who always ridiculed, these would make up for the best red team members, including a professional for professionalism's sake is recommended, and once they’re done, you’ll have everything you need and more, to get started with a well-tailored plan.

The goal is to feel a sense of pride and accomplishment every step of the way, even the most minuscule of achievements can feel so good when you put in the work towards achieving them.

It doesn’t have to be done perfectly, it just has to be done.