PROCRASTINATION AND NOT BEING PERFECT ENOUGH ARE NOT THE REAL FEAR THAT HOLDS YOU BACK!

So let me share with you my story with regards to procrastination and perfectionism…..

From a very young age I was taught that if you are going to do something you must do it properly and perfectly. I remember being in junior high school and doing home economics where we were taught to cook and sew.

My mother was an amazing sewer and she used to sew the most wonderfully perfect dresses for my sister as a hobby and once my sister had grown out of them if I wanted then she would take them in for me.

Anyway, she used to sew, and she used to do it so perfectly and it used to take her a very long time to sew clothes as it all had to look perfect all the time.

I remember in home economics, when I was 12 sewing a pair of board shorts in class and I was so proud of them that I took them home to show my mum I could sew to. When I showed her, she wasn’t all that impressed, and she looked disappointed in me and she told me I had sewed them all wrong. Apparently, it was because I had made a few mistakes in the stitching as it wasn’t straight enough, and I did not tie off the ends of the stitching so they threads could be cut short.

I remember the look on her face as I showed her them it wasn’t the look of a mother that was proud of her daughter but rather a look of annoyance that I had brought something less perfect home to her that I had made. I remember feeling in that space in time hurt, angry, stupid and as though I was not good enough and not perfect enough for her.

Anyway, she took them from me and unpicked all the stitching and sewed them up again with perfectly lined up straight stitching and tied off the threads and cut them off short and gave them to me all perfectly sewed.

I was so upset with myself after that as I thought that I could never make her proud of me.

So I vowed from that point forward to always try to get everything I did as close to perfect as I could. So for many years I did everything I could to my perception of what perfect was and sometimes I used the e

I guess that is also what gave me such a big fear of speaking in front of an audience and also in front of a camera.

It wasn’t until I started working for my current employer and started doing the coaching courses that I realized that those fears were linked to the bigger fear of not being enough.

Because of this I did a lot of soul searching and dove deeper in to why I was that way. Through this soul searching I managed to trace it back to the sewing incident and changed what that moment meant to me in order to move me forward more positively and now instead of working alone I work collaboratively with people at my work and let them know when there are problems and when I need help and know that I don’t have to be perfect to work in the job I work in and I also from a challenge another coaching student gave me to do a 30- day video challenge on Facebook am where I am now.

I did the 30-day challenge and it turned out to be a 90-day challenge and I got some amazing people encouraging me and cheering my video posts on which made me feel way more confident in myself and who I am when it comes to being in front of a video camera and speaking.

My videos are not perfect, but they are genuine and authentic and that is what people like about them. The 30-day video challenge was what made me face my fear of being judged, not being enough and of not being perfect. Now I do not procrastinate or put things off and I get things out there as I know that there is no such thing as perfection.

Sometimes we judge ourselves a lot more harshly than other people judge us, and I have had to let that go and ease up on myself over the past year or so. I am much happier and better for it, but it was not easy, and you all had a massive impact on me with your amazing supportive comments on my posts. Thank you! ©

Copyright © 2022 Lynette Diehm.

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