🙈 Lesson #2 from a recovering perfectionist

Last week we talked about this idea:

Done > perfect.

Sounds like most of you guys are (recovering) perfectionists, so let's add another lesson to our growing list. One that took being in university for 2934 days for me to understand.

Say for a second that you were able to take last week's lesson to heart - you got started, and maybe even finished what you were working on. Good stuff, dude.

You feel proud of yourself for a day or two, then come back to it - and realize that whatever it is that you produced (a report, a project proposal, a poem for your (imaginary) Valentine), is actually kinda bad. Now you're discouraged and never want to create anything ever again.

OK listen. You're always going to have two piles of work:

1. The good stuff that you're mega proud of.
2. The garbage that makes you feel like ass.

Here's the biiiiiiiiiig realization.

Pile #1 can't exist without pile #2. Here's another way to put it: you can't start making cool stuff without fulfilling your quota of failures.

So the next time you take the leap, roll the dice and make something that doesn't work, be excited about it. You're just paying an advance on the next thing that you're gonna be proud of.