Progress > Perfection or Progress < Perfection
Have you done enough, or have you done too much? Where is the line? It can be difficult to find that magic part of where you’ve done enough work on a piece or where you feel you’ve over done it. It takes time to get the amount right. I’ve found that there are times you must go too far before you learn exactly what is enough.
It needs to be perfect before you start. You need to start before it gets to be perfect. Which is better? Is this the chicken or egg question? You know the one about which comes first the egg or the chicken? Before we get too philosophical on ourselves let’s dial it back a bit. It all depends on what you are working on to know if you should look for progress over perfection.
Time Passes
If you don’t start nothing happens. When you do start things might be bad, but the more you do them the better they are bound to get. Growing up watching tv there was a station that I use to watch lots with my siblings called YTV and it’s one slogan was “Time Well Wasted”. If you are working at something that you are passionate about or enjoy, to me it’s the same as time well wasted, whether something comes of it or not.
Perfection
I am terrible at overthinking things. The first time I do things I want it to be perfect. That is far from realistic. I am learning at working at things without it being perfect the first-time round. It is not that I didn’t know that or haven’t done it, but there does seem to be a difference between when it seems more of a conscious thought than other times. The thing you learn over time is that the more you work at your craft the more elusive perfection is but you can still reach greatness.
Progress
I’ve found that the more time I spend building this business the more ideas I come up with. It’s funny at how the last couple years I couldn’t come up with a product to start a business. This year I’m not even at a month into the work I’ve done and I’ve got more ideas than I currently have time to develop. That is the exciting part. As I work on different aspects of the business, I find myself looking for new things to add or change. That leads to other breakthroughs. The self confidence in building this is much higher than it was a month ago starting as well. It’s like most things. The sooner you start, the better it gets. You must get your hands dirty with the way you work.
Impostor
When you start looking into something you typically find a lot of people who are super successful at what it is you want to do. The thing is most people aren’t born superstars. There are those exceptions and the prodigies. I am not one of those people. Thankfully most skills can be learned with constant work. You might feel as if you are an impostor in the beginning, do it long enough and you will feel as if you’ve always belonged.
My Martial Arts Journey
One thing I heard over and over as a question from my martial arts instructor was what is a black belt? The answer: just a white belt that never quit. It’s that simple but far from that easy. It took a solid six years to become a junior black belt and another four years to become a black belt and there were more than a few times where it was frustrating.
I am comparing my business to my martial arts to help me measure my progress. In the way I am thinking of my progress is as how I evolved and got promoted as a martial artist. As I said it took about ten years to become a first-degree black belt, if it takes me ten years to build a super successful business I think it’s worth it. I’m being optimistic in thinking it will go a lot quicker. I was eight when I started karate and I’m twenty-nine starting. I’d like to think twenty years of life, schooling and experiences count for something.
