Tag: perfection

It’s Time To Stop Beating Yourself Up And Give Yourself A Break

Perfection is overrated - give yourself a break!

If you have been following me for the past few months, you may know that my husband and I recently moved with our three dogs.  We placed the majority of our belongings in PODS and downsized from a thirteen hundred square foot home to a six hundred square foot temporary rental while we sell our house.  Our temporary housing is a block and a half away from the beach so it was totally worth it to move into a “tiny” house.

I’m happy to say that the five of us are settling in to our new environment and I’m starting to get a routine down.

Moving is a major transition that can interrupt many areas of your life so I decided to be realistic about the expectations I was going to place on myself during this time.  All was going well on the “grace” front until the voices in my head showed up.  Maybe you are familiar with them.  The voices that whisper to you what you “should” be doing, or that you are failing, or a big slacker.  Yeah, those.

It’s always a good idea to write your goals down and to set dates when you’d like to see them accomplished so I had laid out everything the way I wanted life to look like by this time this month on paper.  It turns out I was being a bit ambitious even though I thought I was being realistic.  There were several things I hadn’t factored in to my day like multiple dog walks now that we don’t have a fence, organizing a “tiny” house, and traveling longer distances to run errands.

Give Yourself A Break

Fortunately, as a coach, I walk people through the process of “giving yourself a break” quite often so I was able to recognize those ugly voices in my head.  I took a step back and listened to the still small voice that was reminding me that we just moved, I’ve been managing the sale of our house, maintaining my business,  taking care of our animals without a secure fence, and figuring out where to buy groceries.  Considering what’s on my plate, things are actually going pretty well.  We only had one dog disappear for ten minutes (totally terrifying), we are eating home cooked meals, I’ve organized all our clothes, I’m still writing this blog, and we are getting outdoors everyday and enjoying this season in our life.  Turns out I’m not a slacker after all.

While most of us know that perfection is totally overrated and none of us can be at the top of our game all of the time, the voices in our head still like to show up and mess with us.  Comparison can kick in and we can run through the list of things we “should” be doing and the areas we think or maybe know we have failed in.  Beating yourself up is not just emotionally draining.  It can kill your joy, your creativity, and your productivity.

It’s important that we work hard and set goals.  It’s also important that we remind ourselves that we only have so many awake hours in the day and that different seasons will produce different results.

If you are in a transition right now or starting something new, I encourage you to walk toward your destiny with a flexible calendar and to be kind to yourself.

Here’s a short Facebook Live post I did last week to help encourage you!

Make it a great week!

Shared with love,
Jennifer

 

Tis The Season To Be Good To Yourself

ledford0416-7746 - Be Good To Yourself This Holiday Season

One of the things I love so much about the holiday season is that it focuses on giving.  This season, I recommend giving yourself a gift and that’s the gift of grace.

All too often, we criticize ourselves for being less than perfect.  Thoughts like “I should have mailed the Christmas cards earlier,” “I should have been more patient with my spouse and/or children,” or “I should be exercising instead of watching dog videos on Facebook” not only rear their ugly heads during the holiday season they can follow us into the new year.

Guilty thoughts that attempt to beat us up usually come from a desire to be perfect.  And, even though most of us know that perfection is impossible, much of the”professional” advertising we see focuses on displaying perfection as a form of happiness or acceptance.  Thank goodness for social media!  Live raw video helps to remind us that nobody is perfect and to give ourselves a break.

Be Good To Yourself this holiday season

No matter how good you get at fending off the guilty voices that like to haunt all of us, they will show up from time to time.  When a guilty thought enters your mind I recommend taking a moment to ask yourself where it’s coming from.  If it’s a habit you know that you need to change, forgive yourself and tell yourself you’ll do better next time.  If you’re feeling guilty about something that is based on society’s opinion of you, it may be something you need to shake off and tell yourself you don’t give a flip what others think.  For example, you just ate a chocolate chip cookie full of gluten and loved it!  There should never be guilt attached to food.  Period.  🙂

I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my life and Lord knows, I’ll make more.  One of the most valuable things I’ve learned from people older and wiser than me is that no matter how many times you beat yourself up, you can’t change the past.  Most of the time the issue causing the guilt is no big deal.  If it’s something that involves others and you need to apologize then I recommend doing so.  If your mistake or failure was a doozy (and I’ve had a few of those) then learn from the mistake and do better next time.

What’s important to remember at all times is that no one is perfect and that if you are doing your very best to be a good person and move forward in your life each day, that is good enough.

Here’s to a wonderful and guilt-free holiday season and new year!

Shared with love,
Jennifer