PERFECTIONISM:
I've struggled for most of my life with accepting my imperfections and failures. As a child, I sincerely wanted to be perfect, or as perfect as possible. As an adult, it still flares up.
For instance: I was in charge of printing the posters for the GPP's upcoming play, and I neglected to send one of our sponsor's logos to the poster designer. He didn't notice, and I didn't notice, until I'd already gotten the dang things all glossy and printed up. In the middle of a GPP committee meeting, I proudly brought out the posters, only to have another member point out that actually, I'd forgotten one of our biggest sponsor's logos.
In the moment, all I could hear in my head was "SCREW UP. INCOMPETENT. How could you forget that? Why are you the president again?", etc.
What actually came out of my mouth was, "Dammit. My bad, folks. Hm. I'll print small logos and affix them to the posters before hanging up any more." This was a reasonable and good solution, and everyone moved on.
But I felt shame and humiliation and anger at myself for the rest of the evening over this (ultimately small) mistake. And in the end, what good were these emotions? They were wasted energy. The issue was already resolved. People weren't whispering about my mistake behind my back and pointing and laughing. (*Though, if they were, WHO NEEDS THEM, EH?? ^_^) Friends and family didn't suddenly love me less, or think worse of me. It was just my ego: My desire to always seem in control and on top of everything and, well, perfect.
Perhaps there's always a tiny bit of self-kicking necessary to remind us to do things differently next time, but after a point, it's more harmful than helpful. (Don't ask me where the line is, 'cuz I don't know)
I've actually become pretty darn good at forgiving myself, which means that these flare ups are typically few and far between. When my motivations are clear - to do my best, to have a good time, to enjoy the results of hard work - the mistakes and screw ups are put in perspective, as part of the whole process. They don't ruin it, they build it.
Here's to all our future screw ups!
SQUATS: Nope.
SPLITS: Sorry.
BOOKS: Got nothin.
WATER: SO MUCH WATER!
EDIT: written mostly on time, posted waaaaaay late
p.s. I can't stop laughing over this gif:
