Stressing Perfection
It sneaks up on me, makes me suspicious, and sees to it that I am stumped. “So far, so good,” I sigh to myself, until it strikes. It leaves me stupefied and shocked. Stress is its name. Bringing me down is how it plays its game. I get stressed. Sometimes I sink into bed and manage to stop thinking about the studying I still need to do. When I wake up before sunrise, I start to stress again. It manages to seep into every single one of my pores. It is a face mask I cannot take off, no matter how hard I pick and peel and pull at it. It is a cycle that I cannot get out of, no matter how hard I try. It exhausts me before I even begin to work. For me, stress is not a sickness. Stress is a major thorn in my side that comes to be when I think too much; and I think very often. I want to know every vocabulary word. I want to finish all of my projects a day before they are due, so there is a plentiful amount of time to proofread. Revise. Edit. Perfect. The pursuit of perfection impedes improvement ‚Äì a quote that I fall in love with every time I read it. The irony almost makes me want to laugh ‚Äì a perfectionist liking a quote about how imperfection is good and perfection is bad? I start to laugh. But then I realize my guffaws are ugly and full of flaws, so I stop. I cannot help the fact that I want to improve. I also want to be perfect. Who does not? I am one of many. The perfectionist in me does not want to be one of many. She wants me to be unique, outstanding, and exceptional. One in a million. Words that are not me. Words that I could be, but something is stopping me. But how? I plead with her. The perfectionist in me wants me to be her, but I just want to be me. So I start; I start to try to be a better me instead of some mediocre version of a perfectionist. I begin to put effort into a happiness journal in which I dedicate a few seconds of each day to “write about one inspiring, happy, motivational, awesome, and unique event per day,” according to the instructions I wrote on the backside of the cover for myself about a year ago. Sometimes I think my entries are too trivial, but I remember that there used to be days when I did not have anything to be happy to write about and would not have had anything to add to my journal, then I am content to write more and more for hours on end. I try to be a better person for the people around me, but also for myself. Now I aim to emanate empathy, foster friendship, present positivity, and make people motivated. I do not want any more people who I am capable of helping to feel hopeless against their own antagonist, whether it is their personal perfectionist or someone else who influences them negatively or anything else. I hope to grow and improve myself in so many ways that I did not think were possible before, or were too difficult for me to even consider. However, the perfectionist in me is impeding my improvement. I cannot be one in a million, not even one in a hundred, if I keep my perfectionist. I try to realize that mistakes are fine. Mistakes are an unavoidable way of life. Mistakes are what make me human. So I let go of my perfectionist, who is my biggest mistake of all, who tries to keep me from being human. She cries and tries to claw her way back into my life. But I slam the door in her face and I laugh. I laugh my breathy, beautiful laughter that is full of imperfections. I will learn to love it.