“We don’t abandon out pursuits because we despair of ever perfecting them.”
- Epicteus
I am always free to iterate on a project or idea in the future, so there is no reason to let perfectionism hold me back. I used to let it hold me back when it came to writing and recording music all of the time. I would begin working on a song and I would not be happy with a part of it so I would obsess over the imperfect part trying to find something that would be perfect, even though I did not already have a plan or idea of what perfect would be. This lead to me having dozens of unfinished recordings of what could have been at the very least fine songs or recordings. While I have not been recording music in a long time, I eventually stopped doing this and instead gave myself a deadline to finish a song, this lead me to finishing songs and not getting stuck in the weeds with sections of the song until I had a finished draft. This meant no matter what I had something that was complete, while I may have been able to bring it closer to perfection, I was free to do this without giving up on the project due to perfection not being met.
I am currently waiting to start classes for my new job in the Navy, so perfection is not currently something that is holding me back from anything important. I guess I could say the place that it holds me back most is in publishing my blog. I do not write and post many times because I do not believe that what I am writing is “good enough”. The issue with that is the more I write and publish the better my writing should get. The content may not become more interesting, but my ability to produce writings should increase, and hopefully my writing will become more clear.
I will not let perfectionism hold me back from posting here on a regular basis, practicing harmonica, and writing code. When it comes time for class I will not let perfectionism hold me back from making progress on my school work because I am obsessing over a problem. Implementing Pomodoro timers will probably help with being held back by perfectionism because it will give me a bit of time to stop and reflect during my work.