Overcoming Perfection

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One of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott wrote, “Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor.”  I can attest to this.  Perfectionism is oppressive.  I’ve spent the majority of my life trying to be perfect…and of course, failing miserably.

I met Jesus on my bedroom floor in 1988.  I was reading a book called “My Best Friend Jesus.”  In this book was a picture of Jesus, literally holding the world in His hands. He had a tear on His cheek.  The message on the page read something to the effect of our sin makes Jesus sad, but because He loves us, He forgives us.  This message taught me two things. Jesus loved me a whole lot.  After all He died for me because He loved me so much.  And I also learned that I didn’t want to sin, because sin hurt Jesus.

Thus began my mission in life, instilled in me at a young age, to be perfect.  Perfection has taken on many different forms, from being neat and organized, to getting straight A’s, to being the peacekeeper among my family and friends, a people pleaser to the core, always trying to be the perfect…whatever role I was playing.  If I could control it, it or I had to be perfect.   

I thought I was doing my best to follow Jesus in my perfectionist aims.   The self-talk that came out of my failures to attain my perfectionist standards was pretty horrible.  Things I never would imagine saying to my worst enemy, I was telling myself constantly.  And worst of all, this soon became how I felt God saw me.  Never consciously aware of what I was putting on God, his identity in relation to me was angry, disappointed, or displeased.

I went through my teenage years perfecting my perfectionist ways.  When I graduated from high school I wanted to continue on with a Christian education, and I decided to go to a Christian college.  I began my freshman year undecided about my major, but my path quickly shifted during my first semester as I was taking Intro to Psychology.  I soon declared my major studying psychology and Biblical studies.  I was hungry to know God more and I wanted to combine these two subjects and become a marriage and family therapist that brought Biblical truth and values into relationships and families.  My college years were filled with interesting classes, great friends, weekly chapels, church, counseling ministries, leading the women’s ministry on our campus, and a special boy.  Life felt perfect, for a while anyway.

Towards the end of my senior year of college, I found myself, like any other college senior stressing and fretting about my next step.  What would I do out there in that big girl world?  I impulsively decided to apply to a masters program in counseling psychology.  To be the perfect student, a grad school education had to be my next step.  I graduated college and one month later started my master's program. 

And soon everything that felt perfect in my life came crashing down.  Two of my  grandparents, that been the heart of my prayers for years to come to know Jesus, both received cancer diagnoses, facing their last days unsure if they truly knew Jesus.  A dear friend struggling with drug addiction took his own life, I found myself forced to let go of a man I thought I would some day marry, and $25,000 and a year and a half into my grad school education, plagued with the feeling of my own imperfections, and not being good enough to become a counselor to others, I decided to drop out.   Everything that I was trying to be perfect at, I failed at, and every imperfect part of my life that I was trying to suppress imploded on me.  Life was suddenly so messy and imperfect.

My perfect dreams and my perfect plans; every perfect ambition faced their disintegration which ultimately unearthed in me such deep self-doubt and feelings of unworthiness.  It took awhile before I was finally able to admit the worst to myself and to God.  I don’t feel worthy of Your love, to be loved by myself or anyone else, I feel lost and depressed, I don’t know what to do with my life anymore.  These were big bleak issues I never thought I’d deal with.  I had no other choice but to walk in this pain.  I couldn’t force perfection on anything anymore.  But in this pain, I really began to see and know who God really was to me. He was compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love and faithfulness.

I began to develop an intimacy with the Lord, a companionship that was consistent.  As this relationship developed and deepened between me and my Lord, I began to learn to take my eyes off of myself and what I thought I should be, who I thought I should be with, and what I should be doing, and fix my eyes on Him more and more.  I felt as though God was leading me to remove my life of shoulds, and simply embrace Him and trust Him wholly that He would lead me in His way, free of my shoulds.  I began to ponder and pray over what my next step was.  What did I have a true affinity for?  What held the possibility of bringing purpose to my life?  I remember telling God that I wanted to be a teacher and I wanted to be a writer.  That prayer felt like an unopened bud.  For once it wasn’t about rushing into something to be relieved of feeling imperfect.  I sat with those two desires.  I held them in my hands and then I gave them over to God.

Perfectionism still steps in from time to time.  I have these certain inclinations and impulses, but more often now under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, I can catch myself.  This deep life-altering struggle with perfectionism was like a catalyst for good things, for God things in my life.  Nothing happens in my perfect way, nor my perfect timing.  But everything happens in His.

Instead of living for the goal of my own perfection, I live my life focused on the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.  Philippians 3:12-15 states, "I’m not saying that I have this all together, that I have it made. But I am well on my way, reaching out for Christ, who has so wondrously reached out for me. Friends, don’t get me wrong: By no means do I count myself an expert in all of this, but I’ve got my eye on the goal, where God is beckoning us onward—to Jesus. I’m off and running, and I’m not turning back.  So let’s keep focused on that goal, those of us who want everything God has for us. If any of you have something else in mind, something less than total commitment, God will clear your blurred vision—you’ll see it yet! Now that we’re on the right track, let’s stay on it."