How to overcome perfectionism and start making something that lights you up!
Are your perfectionist ways sabotaging your efforts to make your thing?
Well hit save on v_25 of that file and get ready to overanalyze my favorite Perfectionist Blasting Tips! **PEW! PEW!** 🔫
1 Create a “holy-shit” deadline
Ya know that whole Parkinson’s law thing where “work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.” It’s a law cause it’s totally true!
If it’s never DUE, it’s never DONE.
If you’ve got perfectionism tendencies, an unlimited timeline pretty much guarantees you’ll keep perfecting and procrastinating until infinity o’clock. Researching, re-designing, re-working — rinse and repeat.
If there’s no deadline, it will never be “ready”.
This is usually the sitch when you’re working on your own personal project and you are your own client.
There’s no account person asking you if it’s ready… no publication deadline that’s gonna be missed… no launch party Friday (that will be super awkward if you show up and start eating all the shrimp cocktail, but you didn’t get around to finishing their project.) 😳🍤
No consequences!
Sure when you work, then rework, your thing forever it might FEEL like you’re being productive, but your project is really stuck in perfectionist purgatory, 👿 the finish line never getting any closer, because it will never FEEL READY.
When I’m working on a project for myself and want to actually finish … my most powerful get-it done trick is to create a “holy-shit” deadline.
Now I’m not talking about putting a cute Post-It note on your desk calendar that says “my launch day” and decorating it with unicorns and rainbows. 🚫🦄 🌈
I’m talking a ticking-time-bomb, if I don’t have this thing done by Tuesday at 1:15 PM my Universe will implode with real consequences Holy Sh#$%*t! deadline! 💣🚨☄️🤯
Real life example:
In a flash of inspiration / insanity I booked and paid upfront for a vendor booth at Women’s Travel Fest with a gut feeling, NO PRODUCT and NO time to procrastinate.🫣
Four months later I flew from Mexico to NYC and unpacked my freshly printed travel journals that I had shipped to my hotel to sell at my booth with mere seconds to spare!
Imagining myself standing behind that booth with literally nothing to show was all the motivation needed to force this perfectionist to finish her project! 🏃🏻♀️
Not finishing was not an option.
What type of Holy Shit deadline could you create to kick your butt into high gear to finish your own project?
2
Announce your thing to the world
A great way to overcome perfectionism and get to work on a personal project is letting your secret out the bag and telling someone else about your dream.
Saying your goal out loud makes it more real, versus you hiding behind your laptop overworking and perfecting. 👩🏻💻
Putting your intention out in the universe creates a little accountability and friendly pressure on you to actually follow-through with what you’ve been talking about!
Tell a fellow creative entrepreneur or tease the idea to your social media peeps. Maybe shoot an email blast to your list that something cool is coming!
Take that idea on a mini test drive around the block and see how great it feels! 🏎️
A word of caution.☝️ Be picky about who you tell. Choose someone that is slow to give their opinion. (Perfectionist don’t need any discouragement!)
Be more of an informant. FYI I’m doing this awesome thing soon… can’t wait to show you … stay tuned! OK gotta get to work BY-EEE! 👋
3 Set itty-bitty goals
If your goal is too daunting your brain may resist the act of even starting.
So instead of saying I will write one chapter a day, try committing to just one sentence.
Instead of saying I will draw for one hour, make your goal to draw for one minute.
This tiny goal setting strategy assures perfectionist brains that even you can’t screw this up.
You can totally crush that itty-bitty goal! No sweat!
The funny thing is, once you get over the starting bit, we tend to keep going. Like a rock falling down over a hill most likely you won’t want to stop and will keep going a while.
But SHHHH!!!! 🤫 Don’t tell your brain that.
4 FPO (For Position Only)
Perfectionist over-edit their work before another human is ever allowed to lay their eyes on it.
At our worst, we’ll find ourselves re-writing the same sentence over and over, or continously redesigning our website, without ever launching the first design.
A great way to trick your brain into moving onto the next task. Is to lie to it!
In the graphic design world we use the acronym “FPO” which means “For Position Only”.
So say I was designing a brochure, but couldn’t find the right stock photo in time for the meeting. I would place a hot pink FPO over the not-quite right photo to show that eventually that would have an awesome photo, but I keep moving on in order to get the rest of the project done.
When you find yourself getting stuck on something. Just tell yourself that’s just FPO for now I’ll go back in and fix that later!
5 Stay stupid
We’ve all been there. You’re hit with inspiration, the ideas are flowing, you’re excited — ready to go all in and make your thing then … SCREEEECH!! You panic, pump the brakes and go into full-on research mode.
“Wait, who am I to make this thing? Is someone else already doing this? I’m just gonna Google this one small thing…”
5 courses, 10 e-books, and 3 Pinterest boards later you feel like you have more to learn than ever. Meanwhile your project is left waiting for you to feel expert enough to deserve to work on it.
Once you fall down the research rabbit hole you might never find your way back out… and if you’re not careful your original enthusiasm might get left at the bottom of that hole of experts.🐇🕳️
So stay stupid!🥸
Especially at the beginning of a project. This helps you get the idea down in its purest form before getting bogged down perfecting the details.
The longer you can keep your idea between just you and the universe the better.
**To help you resist research temptation turn off your WiFi!
