This simple — but profound –- concept alluded me for a large part of my life. You see, I thought that perfection was the benchmark of success. The demand for perfection clouded my eyes and I was unable to celebrate the progress that I was making because of my small successes. You see, perfectionism kept raising the bar of expectation. The fear of failure coupled with a pervasive sense of shame – that I can not be enough – arrested my desire to thrive. In effect, I found myself stuck in an abyss of fear and anxiety.
In my attempt to silence the voice of shame and inadequacy, I found myself tenaciously pursuing the illusion of perfection. As I continued to overcompensate for my sense of shame, I found myself in a dilemma. Because the good that I did was rarely quite good enough, I found myself in an endless cycle of striving to be more through doing more. Over time and through repeated bouts of exasperation I arrived at some definite conclusions. I could not do enough to be enough under the taskmaster of perfectionism.
In the midst of my exasperation I had a spiritual awakening. I was meant to be a human being and not a human doing.
Over time and through being proactively involved in my recovery process I began to realize what I was doing to myself. In my attempt to satisfy the voice of more I set myself up to be irritable, restless and discontent. Irritable when things did not go my way, restless because of my unconscious anxiety, and discontent because I could not be at peace with myself. Consequently, I became frantic in my attempts to force solutions because the outcome was more important to me than the process.
The reality was that in the process of forcing solutions I never got what I really wanted – peace with myself.
Through my pursuit to be free from the faulty belief system of “more”, I have had several spiritual awakenings. With time, my belief system has changed. I am able to be free from the drive to control outcomes because I am not because I do. I no longer feel the need to overcompensate, in order to prove my worth and value. I now know that I am enough. I have come to realize that my life is found in the process, not in the outcomes. Consequently, I can trust God with the outcomes, while I enjoy the footwork.
Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds you plant. Robert Louis Stevenson
I now find myself encouraging people I meet along the path of life with this statement, “Take one step at a time, keep going at what you are doing and before long you will look back and see how far you have come”. By maintaining this philosophy I am inspired to celebrate my small successes because I know that I can trust the process, a loving God and myself.
Receive more articles like this one simply by clicking on Subscribe to Second Chance to Live by email.
Subscribe to Second Chance to Live, Bookmark and Share Second Chance to Live with your friends through a Feed Reader
All material presented on Second Chance to Live is copyright and cannot be copied, reproduced, or distributed in any way without the express, written consent of Craig J. Phillips, MRC, BA
Mike W says
Hi Craig,
Thanks for taking the time to sign up to Blogger to comment on my blog. I do not mean to cause additional hassle for people kind enough to comment, but I do like to know a little more of the people who choose to do so. I’m sorry that it takes a little extra time for that.
Thank you for making contact with me, too. Indeed, there are not many people recovering from a TBI who blog. So it is great to be in touch with the ones that do.
It looks as though we are tackling similar concepts with our blogging. As you have probably seen, I’m trying to keep my blog focused on recovery from all TBIs. If you ever have any related topic you wish to discuss with me, please don’t hesitate to let me know of it.
Best of luck for your blogging.
Kind regards,
Mike Wilkinson
secondchancetolive says
Hi Mike,
Thank you for getting back to me. I appreciate your time and kindness. Thank you for what you shared. The focus of Second Chance to Live is to help both people with traumatic and acquired brain injuries to live life on life’s terms. Through out Second Chance to Live I address a wide berth of topics in such a way to encourage, motivate and empower the reader live life on life’s terms. My interest is to inspire individuals to dream again regardless of their circumstances. Material from Second Chance to Live is designed to help people both with and with out disabilities as well as their family members family and caregivers.
If you get a chance read through my site map https://secondchancetolive.org/site-map/ Mike. In the event that you believe the material that you read from Second Chance to Live can help others, please let them know about Second Chance to Live. Thank you my friend.
Have a simply amazing day and God bless you!
Craig
Our circumstances are not meant to keep us down, but they are meant to build us up!