Perfection Myth

How to better Exercise Failure

By Nicole Irlbeck

“The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.” -Anna Quindlen

Failure can come with many unwanted repercussions.  When we seek to attain a goal or have an expectation in life, and it is met with failure, we often spiral into a state of depression, immobilization, guilt, or hopelessness.  However, it would seem, life allows failures to occur only to remind us that we are human, and to bring us into greater community.

There is not one among us who can honestly say we have not met failure. So, if we know if it is inevitable, why do we fight it so much? “Perfectionism has become a pandemic in women.”, Alice Domar writes in her book Be Happy Without Being Perfect: How to Break Free from the Perfection Deception,  “Ever since women started to read, publishers have been telling women to be better than they are. Be a better mother, be a better wife, be fitter, be this. There's nothing that says you're great the way you are. I think most women out there should embrace the way they are and stop pushing themselves to be better.”

Domar has wonderful words to say, but in order to apply them to our lives in a practical way, we have to learn to embrace ‘becoming ourselves’.   

1) Who are you when no one is looking?  When you quiet the negative voices in your head, what does your heart say about you?  Take 5 minutes daily to focus on a few sentences.  Repeat a specific phrase or word that brings out what resonates most with your authentic self. The goal of meditation is to silence the tapes in your head, but not by telling them over and over to shut up, rather, you find something totally different to focus on.

2) Spend some time journaling daily about how you may tend to please others rather than being true to yourself.  Another topic for journal reflection might revolve around exploring how parts of you may have been made to feel shame, guilt, frustration, rejection, humiliation, dirty, abandoned, anger, or sadness about who you are.  What are some messages that have stuck with you that are no longer serving you anymore?

3) Get out and exercise failure.  This might mean trying something new, going for a goal that you have put on the back burner, or opening up to a friend to keep you accountable. The goal is to stay positive and reward your self for trying, whether you ultimately succeed or fail.

Calvin Coolidge, America’s 30th president once said, “If I had permitted my failures, or what seemed to me at the time a lack of success, to discourage me I cannot see any way in which I would ever have made progress.”

Failure is just one more path toward seeking more of who we are both internally and relationally.  How will you travel on your life path- with apathy and fear, or victory over fear, an embrace of new challenges, and a strengthened ability to appreciate yourself and others?

Nicole Irlbeck began Restoration Fitness out of her love of exercise and her desire to see women making the choice to love their bodies. She incorporates her Masters degree in exercise science, passion for authentic beauty, and athletic performance & rehabilitation experience with women (and buddies!) of all ages and levels to deliver a fun and effective wellness programs. Nicole can be reached through her website at www.restorationfitness.net or by phone at 303.482.6290.