Perfection Vs. Excellence

In this episode, I discuss how perfection is an unattainable ideal or obsessive pursuit of flawlessness, often leading to frustration and stagnation vs how excellence is striving for the highest standards of quality, acknowledging that imperfections may exist but can be opportunities for growth and improvement.

Transcript

Hello,

Hello,

Welcome to the Embodying Greatness podcast.

My name is Christelle Gatto.

And in this week's episode,

I am going to be talking about the distinction or the differences between perfectionism and being in excellence.

And I'm just going to jump right in.

I think this is a really fascinating topic.

This is something that I talk about a lot in trainings.

This is something that comes up a lot with my coaching clients.

So I thought it would be a great topic to dive into.

So first off,

I want to talk about perfectionism.

Now when we talk about perfectionism,

I'm going to refer to and I believe that perfectionism has a lot to do with being externally focused,

Externally driven,

Versus being internally focused or internally driven.

Now when I say internally focused,

I do not mean selfish.

So that's a whole other category that we could spin into,

Which would probably be a really good topic as well.

But we're going to stick with this.

Now usually people who strive for perfection,

Most times set extremely high expectations for themselves and for other people,

Because they're driven by the fear of failure,

Or the need,

Like I said,

For external validation.

So let's also as a side note,

Can we stop using perfectionist as a badge of honor?

I hear so many times people say,

Oh,

Well,

You know,

I'm a perfectionist,

But it's not cute.

Stop doing that.

Literally,

There are so many negative effects that happen when you are striving for perfection.

So in the context of personal growth,

Striving for perfection can have a lot of negative effects.

It can lead to stress,

Anxiety,

Disappointment.

Because perfection is usually impossible,

Then we set ourselves up for disappointment,

For being discouraged.

We end up,

Even on a non-conscious level,

Avoid taking risks,

Because we can't meet our own high standards.

It's crazy.

I also think that when we strive to be perfect,

We actually end up killing off curiosity.

We kill off that childlike wonder that would be available to us if we are vision driven,

Because we tell ourselves that our mistakes and our failures are personal defects.

So again,

We avoid trying new things.

We don't want to be in discovery,

Be in the flow of where the moment may be taking us,

Because we're so focused on having something be perfect,

We're inevitably always going to fall short.

Think about that.

We set our expectations so high,

And then we just keep going and going and going.

One time a mentor of mine said,

It's like rearranging the chairs on the deck of the Titanic,

Meaning that we just get so caught up in the busyness of it,

But really the boat is sinking anyway.

Does that make sense?

It makes sense to me.

So perfectionism is not self-improvement.

At its core,

It's really about earning approval and acceptance from other people.

And I will say this,

I think that most people who identify as perfectionists were probably raised by being praised for achievements and for their performance.

So if you had good grades,

Or you had good manners,

Or you were really great in sports,

Or you looked good,

You had the right hair color,

The right eye color,

The right weight,

You were fit,

All of those things.

If you got praised for those types of things,

That external performance or the external looking good and achievements,

Most likely you grew up to be a perfectionist.

Even if you're a people pleaser,

Or you're a good rule follower.

Somewhere along the line,

We adopt this belief system that if I accomplish this,

Or if I do really well,

And then I get that external praise,

You get that little hit of dopamine that means something about you.

And then you have that become what makes you worthy.

But then here's the thing,

Then you get caught up in this cycle.

And it's like this self-destructive and can even be addictive cycle.

And we don't even know it because it becomes our belief system.

And then that belief system is the thing that fuels our thoughts.

And then those thoughts have us take those actions.

And then if other people outside of us think those actions aren't good enough,

Then we keep going.

And then we're in the hamster wheel.

That's all about getting external validation.

So I think that we get to start understanding,

We get to be aware of when we are trapped in that cycle of wanting to perform,

Wanting to look good,

Wanting to have the perfect content,

Wanting to have all of the likes and all of the followers.

And oh my gosh,

This person is in my field.

This is also somebody who's in the coaching field.

Why is she getting more likes than me?

Why does she have more followers than me?

What can I do?

I need to do more content.

I need more,

Better,

Different.

And then we get stuck in that.

But that's all about external validation.

Understanding the difference between healthy striving and wanting all of those things because you want to bring the content and you want to have that content go out to as many people as possible.

And you want followers and you want likes because you're committed to creating value for other people.

And then the likes and the follows are simply an outcome that's completely different than doing it for the likes and followers or doing it for the praise.

Okay.

So I think we're all pretty clear on that.

So we get to understand the difference between that healthy striving and perfectionism.

And I think that's really where the key lies.

Okay.

So research shows now that perfectionism actually hinders success because it often leads to depression and anxiety and that addiction and then that life paralysis,

Like I said.

And then we miss opportunities because we're too afraid to put anything out in the world that could be imperfect.

I think also Brene Brown has a book called Gifts of Imperfection.

So that's interesting.

I didn't even mean to connect those dots,

But as I said,

Imperfect,

That's what I think of.

So like I mentioned before,

Perfectionism is really a form of self-destruction because there is no such thing as perfect.

It's an unattainable goal.

And then we become addicted to that.

But there's another way,

You know,

And I think the difference there is knowing if you're internally focused or externally focused.

So now excellence on the other hand is about consistently performing at a high level and continuously improving because you want to.

Like without that unattainable demand,

Without thinking that you won't have mistakes along the way,

It's about pursuing what you love and doing it at your best and achieving those results that you want while recognizing that there is room for growth and learning and for stumbling,

Falling down and picking yourself back up.

So again,

In the context of personal growth,

Aiming for excellence has a lot of positive aspects to it.

You're continuously improving.

So there's progress,

You're learning,

You're always in a growth mindset.

Striving for excellence allows you to be flexible.

It allows you to be creative,

Be in the flow because you can acknowledge the mistakes.

And I'm saying mistakes in quotes because at the end of the day,

We know that those mistakes are really part of the learning process.

That's really what stepping into growth mindset is all about.

And it also,

Another thing is it reduces the pressure you put on yourself so you can actually step into having fun and be playful and be light on top of all of that stuff,

You know?

So I think the key difference is perfection is this like unattainable,

Unreachable standard where when you're performing or you're putting out content or you're somewhere,

It's got to be flawless.

You can't have any missteps or mistakes,

Whereas being in excellence allows for that because you know that there really is no mistakes.

There really are no accidents.

And I know as cheesy as that sounds,

And that sounds like a bumper sticker,

If you're listening to this and you could actually shift into that thinking,

Think about all of the freedom that's on the other side of that.

Yeah,

I messed up,

But you know what?

That mess up led to this,

This,

This,

And this,

Or you know what?

I thought that that was a mistake,

But in hindsight,

That mistake actually led to this.

We know that.

There's so much freedom on the other side of just having that mindset instead of having a fixed mindset where mistakes are seen as failures,

Stepping into that growth mindset where setbacks are just simply opportunities for learning,

Opportunities for improvement.

And then also expectations.

Let's talk about that.

Expectations,

Right?

When you're pursuing perfection,

It's just,

It's rigid.

It's not fun.

It's stressful.

It leads to disappointment.

It leads to being discouraged.

It leads to frustration.

Whereas if you can embrace that,

Of course have expectations.

I think I even did an episode on the law of expectation.

Have high expectations.

That's not the point.

The key difference is in the approach and the mindset.

What I really want to leave you with is go about your week and notice where you are.

If you're in that fixed mindset,

If you're stuck,

If you absolutely have to just keep doing things over and over and over,

Rearranging the chairs on the deck of the Titanic,

You're in that busyness,

You're that hamster on that wheel and nothing is good enough and you're frustrated and you're inflexible.

And when you notice that you're in that,

Shifting into that growth mindset,

Shifting into taking a pause,

Looking at this is what I want.

These are the expectations I have.

This is the standard that I have.

These are the results that I want to have and understanding that if you're doing your absolute best,

Then the result is going to always be the result it's supposed to be.

And that takes a lot of trust.

So you get to be attached to the result and unattached to the how you get there.

Be attached to the what and the why.

This is what I want to do and this is why I want to do it.

But then being unattached to the how it gets done,

I'm telling you there's a lot of freedom in that.

Anyway,

That's all I have for you today.

I know that I covered a lot in this episode.

I hope that you enjoyed it.

I hope that you learned something new.

If you want to keep exploring these topics,

Please be sure to subscribe and stay up to date on all of these episodes.

Conversation doesn't have to end here.

Share your thoughts.

If you want to connect with other people in my community,

Connect with me.

If you have any topics that you want me to dive into,

Please reach out to me and let me know.

I would love to cover them.

And until next time,

Let's keep learning and growing and exploring the world around us together.

And I'm going to end this like I do every week.

So remember,

You are in charge of your happiness.

So go out and create something amazing today just because you say so.

Reviews

So interesting to me! ThU!!!
Perfection = External
Excellence = Internal

great talk. i especially loved realizing that i grew up in a rewards environment and how that plays into my attitude towards perfection in my life today 🌞🌹🩷🌞🌹🩷🌞🌹🩷🌞

Wow .. something we should learn early on in life.

A perfect coaching moment 🙏
Namaste, you directed my focus and gave me deep insight 👏💞🌟

Loved this and needed to hear it! Thank you. #recoveringperfectionist