Progress Not Perfection
I can guarantee that anyone that has worked with me in therapy has heard these words. This should be everyone’s measuring stick- realistic expectations/goals. I mentioned in last month's blog that both men and women either set incredibly high, often unrealistic expectations for themselves or have them placed upon them. Our culture, technology and social media(HOLY COW) have increased this tenfold!
Many of us have perfectionist tendencies- I mean, if you take a good, hard look I bet you all can find some. That is a heavy burden to bear no matter who you are.
In the perinatal world we see this quite often. Things are supposed to appear effortless: conceiving, pregnancy, labor and delivery, the newborn phase, parenting, getting “our body back”, balancing household chores, maintaining a relationship with adults, shall I continue? Why should they appear effortless? Because that is what the world tells us and what many people portray on social media. That is where the ugly self comparison comes into play. We should never measure our progress against others- why? Because their story is not our story.
I find that women are really struggling with this at times, myself included. I have challenged clients to reduce self comparison by doing some of the following: removing social media apps from their phone, so it is not right at our fingertips all the time. Some will remove the apps from their phone Monday-Friday and reinstall on weekends. I have even had women “schedule” their social media time: for example 1 hour/day from 7-8PM. These are achievable, realistic goals. Setting goals that are unrealistic and too high only make us feel like failures. It is one thing to strive for excellence but it is quite another to strive for perfection. One will certainly disappoint.
Even in the midst of achievable and realistic goals, we have to show kindness to ourselves. Compassionate self talk or a mantra is an excellent way to be kind to ourselves. We see shirts all around these days that say be kind to others, I challenge you to extend that same grace to yourself. Say to yourself “I am worth it.” Even better, tell yourself “I am enough.” Because you are….
