Push for Perfection - Happiness is Balance

By Mark Kaplan / May 4, 2020

Many psychologists would say that perfectionism might cause personality disorders. The idea is that nothing can be perfect and holding ourselves to this standard could cause lower self-esteem.

I think semantics play a role here and working toward perfection in many important areas of our life increases our growth and the challenge is what makes life exciting. Many athletic competitions give scores of 10 which means its as good as a human can get under the circumstances. The Nobel Prize says someone made the best contribution compared to all competition. A’s in school say a person produced all that was asked of them.

Where Should We Push for Perfection?

Robert Mauer in his book Mastering Fear said three important areas in life are career, health, and relationships. I might add that passions are a fourth important area. His premise is that all successful people have fear when pursuing their goals and rarely mention the word stress or anxious. Kids only talk about fear and never say they are anxious.

Fear becomes an indication our pursuit is important to us. I have lots of fears and experience them when I want to do something new. What if I fail? What if I don’t live up to my expectations? What if I don’t live up to the expectations of others? What if my new exploit reveals I am not all that?

George Clooney, famous actor, said he always fears the crew of his movies might think he is not a good actor and shouldn’t be on the movie. Lynn Swann, famous NFL receiver in four Super Bowls, said he was always afraid he would let his team down or get injured. Fear made him better.

The bottom line is we should pursue activities and goals that would be important to us feeling we are living purposeful lives and include fear as a good indication we are on the right path. Careers, health, relationships, and passions are a good place to start. What if we grew in each a little each day?

What’s Flow Got to Do With It?

Steven Kotler in The Rise of Superman chronicles how extreme athletes continuously do the impossible. They engage in activities in which they have competence and push the envelope to create challenge. They are able to block distractions and allow their whole brain/body to perform without them thinking. The prefrontal cortex which judges us is shut down in flow.

This opens the channels for pursuing perfection as man’s highest bliss state and arena for peak performance. All performers, speakers, and artists, to name a few, want to reach flow to produce their best performance, find their potential, and enjoy the feelings created in this state. Dean Cotter, soloist rock climber (without ropes) says he climbs for the feelings he experiences, not to get on top of rocks.

So the proof is in the pudding. We pursue perfection for the feelings we experience when we are engaged in something challenging that could help us reach our potential. Our potential might be perfection and we might never reach it, but we can feel exhilarated and purposeful in the meantime and are probably making a big contribution to the world with our endeavors.

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