I don’t know where you live, but where I live, my culture worships perfection. From today on out, I’m done with it. I’m worshipping messiness instead.
Sure, I’d like to have a more-perfect life. A house that is more clean than cluttered? A schedule that contains empty space? A work-life balance that a reasonable person could mistake for balanced, and a social life that addresses me and my interests more than my kids’? That all sounds terrific.
Photo by Metalgirlcrafts on Etsy. Click photo to visit shop. I am not affiliated with Metalgirlcrafts or Etsy in any capacity.
It might be nice to be more in control of things than I actually am. But I won’t ever know, because not only am I not in control, I’m not going to be, and I’m not pretending otherwise.
It’s not the crime that gets you. It’s the cover-up.
You can live in honesty about things, or you can live in denial. Choosing denial means that confronting your own failures and brokenness is so painful that it’s not only preferable, it’s actually easier, to live in a constant state of pretending. For some people, it’s easier to live in a make-believe place where everyone’s job is perfect; where the children, as they say in Lake Woebegon, are all above average; and where none of the family portraits look like these.
via GIPHY.
Unfortunately, worshipping perfection is unsustainable. It sets up an unrealistic standard and makes us feel guilty when we fall short, so we set another unrealistic goal, trapping us in an unvirtuous circle. We can keep it up for a while, but we can’t keep it up forever. Something’s gonna snap. Women are particularly susceptible to this narrative, but we’re not the only ones.
Choosing sustainable living
To me, staging a daily performance (plus a Sunday matinee) of manufactured perfection doesn’t sound easy. It sounds like a lot of work, and I’m wiped out as it is. Maybe I’m lazy, but to me it seems easier to be honest about the mess.
But for a lot of people, brokenness is shameful. They think it signals some sort of fundamental unworthiness. That’s the part I take issue with.
So I’m here to tell you: We are all good and worthy, just as we are.
And to underscore the point: I’m a hot steaming mess, and I don’t mind.
Culture is a hard thing to fight.
Okay, most some of the time I don’t mind. Full immunity to the get-it-together narrative hasn’t taken hold in me yet. My internal voice-over chides I should have my life together. I should be more organized. I should be early, under budget, my work flawlessly reasoned and meticulously executed. I shouldn’t forget things, or run my house with the sole ambition to keep the health inspector at bay.
Anytime someone asks me for something, I tell them I’m working on it. That’s where I am with the perfection narrative: I’m working on not-minding.
That’s why I’m writing this blog. The shoulds pile up faster than dirty socks around here and trip me up. Culture shoulds all over my desk and my kitchen table and in the middle of the floor. Sometimes the shoulds pile up so high it’s hard to see around them. This blog delivers a periodic note-to-self that not only is messiness okay, it’s arguably the only normal and honest state of being there is. This blog can remind you, too, if you likewise feel smothered by a lot of shoulds, that you are okay.
It’s one thing to strive to do better or master things. It’s another to hold yourself to impossible standards and beat yourself up for falling short. I’m done with that. You’re welcome to tag along and see my work-in-progress, toast marshmallows with me over my personal dumpster fire. Bring your own sticky mess with you, and we can work on it together.
