good not perfect

Over the last few days I've been struck by the idea of wanting a good life.  Not a perfect life - a good life.

I'm a perfectionist, just ask my family.  I have activity books I never touched because I wanted them to be perfect.  There was a sticker "collection" because you can't move stickers once they are on paper so I never had the guts to stick them somewhere. The countless activities I never tried because I knew I wouldn’t get them “right”. The call to my mom freshman year because I was getting a "B" and the list could go on.

I can’t say I've completely moved past perfectionism (I still write a lot of things in pencil) but I’ve gotten better.

This week it struck me why I’ve felt stuck for so long.  I don’t start things because I want them to be perfect before I even get started.  Take this blog.  I’ve wanted to have a blog for a while.  In fact, I had one a few years back but it never went anywhere because I felt my pictures weren’t perfect, I didn’t have a logo, my brand wasn’t strong enough, you name it: there was an excuse.  But the few posts I wrote, I really enjoyed sharing.  It brought me a little joy to know someone may have clicked on the link and enjoyed something they saw.  I thought I’d take a step back and get it all together and have an amazing relaunch, but perfectionism kept me from pursuing.

The revelation that hit me this week was: I don’t want a perfect life.  My version of a perfect life always came with measuring what I’m doing to someone else. So many times I’ve made a list of the things I need to do to make my life “better” and let me just say, whenever I started trying to do all the things it was overwhelming, tiring and made me feel worse in the end.  It leads to me feeling like I’m not enough.

I want a good life.  A life I am happy with regardless of whether it measures up to anyone else's standard.  Because, to me, a good life can only be measured by you.  My good life involves people I love, yarn and baking.  That’s not everything that makes up my good life, but it’s a piece of it and just typing those words out makes me smile.  It’s been really freeing as well because to me, a good life involves wiggle room, forgiveness and change whereas with perfection, I didn’t start because I was fearful of never measuring up.  I'm learning there’s freedom in goodness.

Now it’s your turn: What is part of your good life?