What have you perfected? I found as a kid I was an impeccable athlete. Any sport. I was first pick for the girls, boys never complained about having me on their team, hell, I beat half of them and I never feared my opponents. I was highly competitive....maybe even slightly annoying. My competitive attitude, although I still love to compete, has become more graceful...and has also changed gears. Not playing sports all the time, I've found I'm not as bad ass as I once was in this department. With age, responsibilities and growing-up this is sure to happen, but there are other things I have grown to be good at, tried to Perfect.
Not everything in life is like riding a bike and no one just got on the bike and started going. You have training wheels, which are heightened as you gain balance, and then everyone remembers the first day they rode their first two wheel...big boy/big girl bike. From there you gain the skills to harness other tricks if you so choose and there are many brave athletes that now make a living off BMX racing. Perfected it? I think not, but very damn good at it? Absolutely!
What am I getting at? Two points, Number One: To be perfect at anything, one needs to practice. We practice things everyday and we don't even realize we are doing it. What do you do for work? 40+ hours a week we practice our jobs....Every week. That's what makes us valuable. Are you a mom? A dad? 24/7....you are practicing. Like to read? The more you read, do you become a better, faster reader? Do you enjoy it more each time? Practice, Practice.
Now it's easy to say that oooh, I want to be perfect at something so I'll just practice, but there is more to it. As we practice, we learn better "practices". Most of these are done through mistakes, accidents, and ruling out the bad. Show me someone who has never fallen off a bike while learning to ride it, ground a stick-shift while learning to drive it, or had a near mental breakdown while trying to see eye to eye with their significant other, and i will show you a liar. Most people learn from these "bad" practices, others are what we call stubborn and ignorant. Know a few?
Anyways the truth of the matter brings us to, Number Two: There is no PERFECT. Which is sort of a let down in a way, but it is the truth. Tell me something Perfect. I bet your Perfectly Good Brain can't do it. What I will now refer to as the "Belief In Perfect" has a huge impact on us as people, more than we know. I would confidently say that the "Belief in Perfect" can alter one's mindset and at times lower their self-esteem. Other times, it brings out the strongest motivation an individual has. We see practices and fall outs of this belief everyday. Two extremes are; from a mother crying after having a bad day with her child and striving to be the perfect mother, and the 8 year old that practices basketball in the driveway, everyday after school because one day, he's going to be the perfect basketball player. Neither will happen, but the "Belief in Perfect" will always be there because without it, there's nothing to strive to be except the best, which is always replaced by better. Without Perfection defeating you every so once in awhile, you will never be able to enjoy close to perfect moments that remind you of why you're on the track to perfect. It's like the saying, without the rain, you wouldn't appreciate the sunshine. So just because there may not be a Perfect, the "Belief In Perfect" is what keeps the heart beating, like Santa Claus.
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