Letting Go of Perfectionism

I just recently met today’s guest poster, Cindi Cotton, in the last few months. It didn’t take me long, though, to realize that from her gentle and quiet ways springs godly wisdom and insight that I knew I wanted to share with our Ruffled Mango readers. I love her topic – perfectionism. It’s a disease I struggle with myself, but I’m also learning to let go of it…and a sigh of relief always follows. Enjoy the read, dear sisters, and give yourself some grace – especially this week leading up to Christmas Day. ~Kristen 

Most of us like to strive for perfection, even if we don’t admit it. I always wanted to keep order in my home—a place for everything and everything in its place. I knew this couple back before I had children. They were house parents, and they had three children of their own. We would go to meet with them in their home every week, and the meetings took place in their living quarters. There was NEVER anything out of place. EVER. EVER. Their little girls never got out a toy until they put away the toy they were playing with. EVER. There were never stacks of mail and paper to be sorted. EVER. They were the most organized people I have ever known. On the other hand, their youngest child was still nursing, even though she was walking and talking in complete sentences, so as I look back I’m thinking there was a degree of weirdness going on in their family. 😉 But I wanted to have that super organized home that they had.

Problem was that most of the people in my home didn’t agree with my high standards. With each addition to the family, the lack of organization (perfection) grew exponentially. I did have hope with my youngest, Ashlee. When she was a toddler, she was always picking up her toys and putting them away, and she loved to put things in the garbage. Sometimes she would dispose of things we weren’t ready to get rid of yet, like car keys. But as she got older, her seemingly inborn tendency toward neatness became a recessive trait, and as of today it hasn’t really returned.

The desire for perfection is especially difficult at the holiday season. We all want that Hallmark holiday Christmas, that Norman Rockwell picture, the stuff that Christmas songs are written about—you know something like It’s A Wonderful Life or White Christmas. Or my favorite Christmas movie, Christmas in Connecticut (if you haven’t seen it, you really need to reassess your priorities in movie watching). In reality, the holidays can be more somewhere between National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation and A Christmas Carol, with a little of How the Grinch Stole Christmas thrown in for added disappointment. This used to really bother me. A LOT. Somewhere along the way I got some insight into the holidays. And this is what I realized. There are no perfect holidays because there are no perfect people or perfect families. The Christmas movies, songs, magazine spreads, and even TV commercials can make you feel like such a holiday failure. It can be a big messy letdown when your holidays – and your life – don’t seem to be as beautiful and effortlessly perfect as everyone else’s. But when I realized that – just like fairy tales aren’t real, the depiction of holidays isn’t real either; and it was a lot easier to just let it be and enjoy what I had. What I had wasn’t all that bad, and it was more than enough. Except for that one Christmas when one of the girls got strep throat on Christmas Eve—I could have done without that!

This led me to an even greater insight: I don’t have to have a perfect life. I’m not perfect, so how can I expect perfection in my family? I don’t mean we shouldn’t do our best, give our best, or be our best, or try to improve. But I do mean that we ARE enough just the way we are. God’s love brings perfection and completeness that we will not find this side of heaven. But He sees past our flaws and loves us completely anyway.

A while back some of the ladies at my congregation had a painting class where an artist guides you to paint a picture. Our picture was a cute snowman. I was doing pretty well until we got to the carrot nose. I knew it was going to be hard, and I was RIGHT. I even got an artistic friend named Livvie to help me with the shading…but it still wasn’t right.

When you look at my snowman, there’s something not quite right, isn’t there? IT’S THE NOSE! It is too far to the left, and it looks like a big orange mustache to me. It was really bothering me when I got home that night. I texted a picture to Ashlee. She said something like, “Cool!” and I told her that it looked like a mustache instead of a nose. No comment back. See, I was right!

My husband texted me the next morning and said it was an awesome job. Again, I texted back and pointed out that the nose was ALL WRONG. Neither of them disagreed with me. Next, of course pictures of our group were posted on Facebook. One of the comments said, “Like to look at all the different noses.” WHAT? IS SHE KIDDING??? I was thinking she should have just said, “Look at that nose that is really disguised as a mustache.” You see, we focus on our own flaws. I couldn’t see ANYTHING else but that silly nose.

When it comes to our flaws, our mistakes, our messy mess-ups, nothing is so small that we can’t blow it out of proportion. Now I’m not saying that you wouldn’t have noticed something not quite right about my painting if I hadn’t pointed it out, but what I am saying is that it is the FIRST thing I see EVERY time I look at it. This is the way we can be about our shortcomings, our lack of perfection. We notice the shortcomings and nothing else. We don’t see what is right, because we focus on what is wrong. That is Satan at work. He gets in our heads. He shames us. He convinces us that we are unworthy because we are not quite right. We allow him to lie to us, and we believe his lies.

So what do we do? It goes back to letting go of that ideal perfection that we strive for and cannot reach. When we stop trying to do the impossible, we start to enjoy what we have. And we see that what we have is enough. We start to look for progress, not perfection. When we start to see ourselves the way God sees us, we are heading in the right direction.

So, back to my painting. I have to tell you that it was really bothering me. I thought about painting over it and trying again…not a good idea since I had no clue on how to improve upon my failure. I have a wonderful work friend who is an artist. A legitimate, paid-to-do-it artist. I seriously thought about taking my painting to her and asking her to fix it. I know she would have done it without hesitation, and it would be beautiful, something I would be proud to display. But I didn’t take it to her, and I’m not going to. I need to look at the painting every holiday season—to remind me that just like my snowman, the holidays aren’t perfect. They may be a little bit off.

I may need to look my snowman every day, but I won’t. I’m not crazy! I need to be reminded every day that life isn’t perfect. And it never will be. EVER. Things this side of heaven will always be a little bit off. But when I look at my snowman, I will remember that God sees past the things that are a little bit off. He sees what I can become when I allow Him to sit on the throne of my heart and let Him be the guiding force in my thoughts, feelings, and actions. He makes me perfect. Nothing I can do, no do-over, no going to a professional will bring me to perfection. My only hope is in Jesus and His grace. There is a song, Flesh and Bone, written by Matt Maher, and it speaks to this idea:

I met a man who walked on water
Who wore His crown like a blue collar.
I met a man who treated children
Like they were ambassadors to the Kingdom

If I saw the world in Your eyes
Would it help me understand?
How You see through all our lies
Still You hold us in Your hand

I’m dying to believe
I’m trying just to show
That we’re less than perfect
More than flesh and bone

People climbing trees to catch sight of You
Broken and blind searching for the truth
We’re crippled by our fears and torments
Oh, Son of man, have pity on Your servants

If I saw the world in Your eyes
Would it help me understand?
How You see through all our lies
Still You hold us in Your hand

I’m dying to believe
I’m trying just to show
That we’re less than perfect
More than flesh and bone

I wander and I want
Squander the riches of Your love
It’s never enough for me
Oh, take this poverty and nail it to this tree
And all that’s captive shall go free, I’m free

And if I saw the world in Your eyes
Would it help me understand?
That You see through all our lies
Still You hold us in Your hand

I’m dying to believe
I’m rising just to show
That we’re less than perfect
Yeah, we’re less than perfect

That we’re less than perfect
More than flesh and bone

We have to let go of our perfectionism. We are free in Jesus! Free to be just a little bit off, just a little less than perfect, but more than flesh and bone.

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Cindi and her husband, Todd, live in Henderson, TN and worship with the Estes church of Christ, where she teaches a second grade Bible class and assists with Bible Bowl. They are empty nesters, having raised their daughters, Aimee and Ashlee. Cindi works at the STAR Center in Jackson, and is a facilitator for Recovery-Through Christ. She loves her family, including grandchildren, Jacob and Cheyanne. She also loves cross stitch, coffee, laughing with girlfriends, and walking closer with God.

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