Done is Better Than Perfect

 keeping myself in a consistent habit of posting, I know I’ve missed a week; I’ve taken the extra step by signing up for Stickk.

Stickk is a goal-setting site that you can set up to help you follow through on any goal you have. Setting any amount of time to allow for the completion of the goal you may want to complete. The kicker is you can allot money for each task every time a goal is not completed. If you don’t follow through in your allotted time, your money will go to an anti-charity of your choosing. So every time I don’t follow through with posting once a week, 25 dollars goes someplace I don’t want to donate. There is something very motivating about not giving money to Mitch McConnell or some pro-life organization; these are examples, not my anti-charity. There are too many things I would hate giving any amount of donation. And as double accountability, you can ask someone to be your referee so that someone is checking on your progress. I have asked my boyfriend, Mike, to be a referee. Maybe I should call him ref from now on?

For the time, I’m using this to help me accomplish my goal. Someday I would like to think I won’t be motivated by giving money to something I hate. But I know I need accountability, at least right now. And I know If left to my own devices, I would write a bunch and then not post, and then this little blog would sit dormant again.

A few days ago, I received a drawing of my cousin and me as little kids in a text message. My grandma, who I had no idea she even drew, had drawn it from a photo of my cousin and me, and I’m pretty sure the photograph is floating somewhere; I’ll try to post it when I find it. My cousin, who sent the text and not the cousin in the drawing, said my grandma was too embarrassed to show her artwork. So I don’t know if posting it here is embarrassing her from the grave, but here it is.

I do get the struggle of creating and then hiding it. Something I struggle with even more is not being perfect. And then talking myself out of not finishing it, or not posting it. There are so many things I’ve just stopped doing because I don’t think it’s perfect.

Jami Attenburg is a writer who has a great weekly newsletter called Craft Talk. Last week she wrote about a friend working on this extensive project but kept pushing the finish line back because the friend didn’t think it was perfect. Jami writes that we all want whatever we create to be perfect, but it’s so much more important to be done. To finish even when we think it’s not perfect.

I have to remind myself of this. I don’t need to have perfect stories and write perfect sentences. It just needs to be done. I just need to keep doing this thing that I want to keep doing but find myself putting off. I’m writing to keep myself in practice. Practicing and then finishing.

Because done is better than perfect.