Last updated on December 30th, 2019 at 10:58 pm
Perfection is just an excuse not to launch or take further action to make your big dream come true.
Now don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that I don’t think that you shouldn’t do your very try your best, but when you work on your big dream, you won’t be as good as you will be once you’ve been at it for a while.
Working on a dream goal forces you to use emotional muscles you haven’t used before. The universe of dreams-come-true requires that you give time and effort as payment for realizing a dream.
And your payment could require anything from 5 to 25 years, or more.
At the start of your dream journey, you need to honestly ask yourself if you are willing to do whatever it takes to make your dream come true–no matter how long it takes.
If your dream is to be an influential blogger, understand that just because you are a great writer doesn’t mean you will be celebrated at blogging and social media right away. Becoming a prominent blogger is very different from writing an English paper for a grade or writing a book for a publisher. Blogging is part conversation, part link building, part trends, part networking, and understanding how websites work. Influential blogging is more Internet marketing than English prose–although good, crisp, engaging writing helps. Excellent storytelling helps too.
You have to accept the fact that you don’t know everything you need to know to achieve your dream. And that’s OK. You just need to start. But don’t try to be perfect. Perfection will come with practice.
You will feel uncomfortable, stupid, like an impostor, and often searching for a reason to quit. As best-selling author, Seth Godin likes to say,
Your lizard brain flies in to stop you.”
In the tech world, I came from we launched every product before it was finished and “perfect.” You learned quickly that “good enough” meant “launch now!” It is better to launch and adjust than to miss your launch date.
Launching is everything. Perfection is not.
It is better to start your dream instead of waiting until everything is perfect, and you think you’ve got “it down.”
There is no “perfect.” There is no “ready.”
I know writers who get upset over other’s misspellings and typos on the web–while they ignore the standards for writing web content themselves–not realizing there are hundreds of software engineers, web developers and Internet marketers rolling their eyes at their content.
Stop worrying about perfection. You aren’t perfect. Accept it and focus on getting something done.
Understand that as a dreamer, you simply aren’t going to please everyone, so you have to decide to make an attempt. Be open to accepting feedback and constructive criticism while you learn to be better. Be willing to change and grow into your big dream. Feedback is your temperature gauge to make sure you work on your dream in such a way to become a success.
When a blogger first begins, they tend to overshare personal information and jump around from subject to subject–rather than thinking about the reader. With time and practice, the writing evolves into its niche, which engages the readers. A top blogger is a master of the kind of story-telling that makes the reader feel the story is about them too.
Your big dream is an art form that can take years to develop, so don’t quit your day job.
As you cultivate the idea of dreaming big in this coming year, promise yourself that you will give up on the idea of perfection. Perfection is an impossible standard. Think more about how passionate you are about what you love and start there. But most importantly, START.
And remember the words of the famous French novelist Gustave Flaubert,
Artists who seek perfection in everything are those who cannot attain it in anything.”
Catherine Hughes
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Catherine Hughes is the founder, content director and editor-at-large of 8WomenDream. She is passionate about helping women step out of their own way and strike out into a world waiting for their special talents. She’s a published author and a former award-winning mom blogger. Catherine has helped companies both large and small create engaging web content, social media narratives, and unique blogging platforms. She claims to be a redhead, but don’t hold that against her.
Note: Articles by Catherine may contain affiliate links and 8WD will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on an affiliate link.
