“If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.”
— G.K. Chesterton

I recently came across this quote. It certainly points to a lesson I so often must remind myself, as one who leans toward perfectionism: Don’t let PERFECT become the enemy of the GOOD.

Young people are constantly being told to “… try, try and try again …” I certainly remember hearing it a lot when I was growing up. And I must confess, the lesson really didn’t hit me in a real way until I was in my late forties (and that was ten years ago)! Don’t mistake me — I had “tried” many things throughout my life to achieve desired goals, but too often I would let the results, which were inevitably far below my expectations, STRESS ME OUT or make me feel depressed and unworthy. This made the idea of “trying” far less than the adventurous learning experience that it should be, instead, feel like needless self-punishment. What’s the point in that, right?

So how does one try something, but avoid the stress of failure? The truth is, you can’t avoid it completely.

But you can reduce it significantly. Doing so starts with knowing and understanding what stress really is:

STRESS is the DIFFERENCE between EXPECTATIONS and REALITY.

STRESS is the difference between expectations and reality. Actually, the preferred term I use over “difference” is “deficit.” Stress is nothing more than a mathematical equation — one in which YOU have total control over one of the integers!

And this is where we introduce the idea of “Imperfect Action.”

When you focus yourself on learning to play an instrument, throw a ball, or code on a computer, you start out by taking imperfect action. You make the effort, knowing that you will not likely create the results that you know you wish to create — but you take action anyway.

And when the “imperfect results” unfold, are you stressed out about it? Maybe a little — but far less than you would have had you anticipated more.

The point here is, not to expect failure, but to be intentionally realistic about the results that may unfold. Nor does imperfect action imply that you should not give something your best effort. Rather, it is a simple acknowledgement of reality: even our best efforts are far from perfect; and that imperfect action, in pursuit of a worthy goal, is far better than no action at all.

I for one, have found this reframing of stress quite liberating. And when my results are higher than expected, it also makes for a nice surprise.