Those of you who know me and have witnessed my atrocious spelling in emails, may laugh when I claim to be any kind of perfectionist.  But in my heart, I know I have a craven desire to do everything perfectly the first time.  And when I stuff up, I stop trying.  Or even worse, fear stuffing up, so I don’t even try at all.  If I were to list the worst casualty to my need for perfectionism it would be the loss of enjoying myself and not being in the moment.  Examples spring to mind, such as there is no such thing as Bad Karaoke.  Just a fun night out with friends involving singing.

Louise Hay on her CD How to Love Yourself, calls it ‘The Curse of Perfectionism, where we don’t even try anything new because we are afraid of failing the very first time.  She goes on to say that Number Three on her top ten steps you can take to love yourself is to be gentle and kind with yourself – that it is OK to make mistakes when you are learning. [By the way, numbers one and two on how to love yourself more are “Stop all Criticism of (yourself) and Don’t Scare Yourself with your thoughts of impending doom and disaster.] Continue reading →