Embracing the "Good Enough"

My father was a perfectionist and was frequently heard saying, “if you are going to do it, do it right”.

As a teenager and young adult, while I may not have always given 100% to everything I did, I did try to do things as right as I could. While raising my children, I often counseled them that a job well done felt a whole lot better than a half-hearted attempt at something.

But you know what? As someone who suffers from OCD, this can take on a whole new meaning. Doing it “right” can mean striving for an unreachable level of perfectionism and subsequent feelings of disappointment when things aren’t “perfect”. So many lists, always wondering if I had really done my best, left me feeling frustrated and tired.

Add on the extra layer of stress that these crazy times has added, and I sometimes found myself too overwhelmed to even start a task, much less complete it with the level of attention that I used to. However, this weekend, I challenged myself to “embrace the good enough”.

Don’t get me wrong, there are times when good enough isn’t…well…good enough. Providing appropriate safety, care and health measures for you and your family, your main tasks at work, etc. But there are plenty of opportunities to give ourselves grace and just DO THE BEST WE CAN.

So, this past weekend, when I looked at my carpets and knew they needed cleaning in anticipation of my crawling grandson’s visit. The old me would have moved out every piece of furniture I could to give myself a wider space to clean. This weekend, “good enough” me cleaned the exposed pieces of carpet where he would be crawling (let’s face it, he’s not going to be crawling under the chest coffee table or skirted swivel chairs, right?). And you know what? It was good enough.

This blog? While I could have spent a few more hours editing and polishing it up; I’m going to go ahead and post it. My message is clear, even if I may have been able to make it “catchier” or stated my thoughts more eloquently.

Give yourself a break. Do the best that you can do in this moment. I hope you’ll find that it’s “good enough”.

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