Imperfection

We all know that we are flawed human beings, and yet we continue to pick at perfection. Why do we do that when we know there will always be someone who is better than us in some area of our lives: richer, thinner, younger, etc? Instead of that knowledge acting as an invitation to self-acceptance—it appears to light the fire of competition. Even though we’ve been taught that comparison is the thief of joy, we still jostle with the Joneses, because we feel less than when we don’t think we are equal to.

I reject that. Sometimes, we just have to look in the mirror, over our bank account, or at our relationships, and declare, “This is an imperfection I’m willing to live with.” Getting too fixated on a one problem can lead to creating three more. Not everything needs to be perfect, in order to be valuable.

Too often, instead of appreciating the charm and cozy familiarity that comes with reasonable imperfections—like the kind we allow ourselves to embrace in an old farmhouse or Victorian home—we treat ourselves, and the people around us, like houses in constant need of updates in order to retain our value. We do this because we’ve been conditioned to strive for the best and compare ourselves to those we think have achieved that. We look at someone else’s house, and we think it’s nicer than our own, and these conclusions illicit feelings of inferiority; but just because we can’t see the blemishes on the outside of another’s perceived perfection, doesn’t mean there aren’t some loose screws and faulty wiring behind that smooth exterior. Trust me, no one lives in a flawless house or a perfect body—we are all fixer-uppers from the day we’re born until the day we die—but we can get so fixated (little pun there) with the problems in our home that we forget the privilege that have a home. If we have a home to complain about, that means we have a home to be grateful for. If we’re alive enough to complain about our bodies, then we’re alive enough to be grateful for living! We get to appreciate everything about our bodies that’s keeping us alive: our amazing hearts pumping blood, our brilliant brains firing neurons, and our open arms holding the people we care about. Our bodies are miraculous, even when flawed, and they deserve more love and less criticism.

Unless our flaws are truly hurting our health, our relationships, or our finances, we don’t have to fix them. We can actually embrace them as comforting, functional quirks that make us who we are. The Navajos believe that only God is perfect, and humans cannot achieve that same level of perfection. Therefore, they intentionally leave a little imperfection in anything they create. In this way, we celebrate our humanity by honoring our imperfections. When someone in our household makes a mistake, we say, “Congratulations, you’ve just proven that you’re human!” But a perfectionist has trouble taking that in because too often they see anything that’s not perfect as being a failure and perfectionist fear failure to such a strong degree that it can prevent them from pursuing their passions.

The core of perfectionism is equating our accomplishments (status, skill, wealth, and health) to our value; this is often paired with a deep, unresolved shame that’s been tied to prior failures. I write a few chapters on shame and how to process and overcome it in “Sage Words FREEDOM Book One.” If you’re someone who is too often picking apart yourself or others, please read what I’ve written on the topic of shame and let me know if it helps.

“The blanket we use to cover our flaws can suffocate our virtues.” page 4

Knowing that our worth isn’t because of who we are, but rather that we are, is the first step we take to believing we have value in this world above and beyond our accomplishments. Recognizing there is more than one right way to move through the world can help us assuage our addiction to certainty, our belief in “perfect” and embrace our imperfections.

I invite you to ask yourself what flaws, can you not only live with but learn to appreciate, in yourself and others?

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I’m Sage Justice, author of “Sage Words FREEDOM Book One.” and my purpose in life is to infuse empathy, wisdom, integrity, and humor (whenever possible) into universal challenges. When you like and share my posts, and follow my author page, it helps me spread messages of unity to create peace and understanding. If you’d like to read more pieces like this, please check out the book on Amazon, monthly articles at SageJustice.Substack.com, videos on YouTube (Sage Words: Almost Everything You Need to Know), inspiration on IG @SageWords2027, website and the podcast: Sage Words (Apple & Spotify). A like and follow on the Sage Justice, author page, on facebook is greatly appreciated. Thank you.