Sheryl Sandberg has a project to ban the word "bossy" because she doesn't like how it's undercutting girls' ambitions to be leaders from a young age. I really like the idea. I have a young daughter who could be described as bossy, but I haven't yet and hope to never use the term when talking to her. She is "leadership oriented." Yes, I got that phrase from another mom at a playground here in Seattle who used that term to describe her daughter. We both had a good laugh about it and we could because as cheesy as that replacement term sounds, we know who these little girls are. They are natural, fierce little leaders, and man are they hard to raise! All I can do is hope I channel all of my daughter's energy in a constructive, appropriate way.
Drawing from that campaign, I've been thinking about how I'd really love to #banperfect. Maybe it's because I'm a lifelong Mormon or maybe all religious people can relate or maybe our society has had this impact on other people, but I think the word "perfect" helps no one. First of all, in the scripture we always quote, Matthew 5:48, "Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect" the word "perfect" means in Greek "to be complete, finished, fully developed" as identified in the footnote. We can't be complete, fully developed and especially finished until we're dead. So why do we even use the word "perfect" to talk about our conduct in this life? The admonition to do so has never inspired me, it's only made me feel like I fall short.
So, I'd like to hear an end to these statements:
"I'm only human, I'm not perfect."
"I didn't do it perfectly, but..."
"I'm a perfectionist." I might give a pass on this one, because there are some things that you can be perfect at that can be really satisfying. But even then, it's not factual to say the sentence, "I made the most perfect brownies tonight!" because it's still relative. Does that make sense?
I'd like to hear more of these statements to inspire people:
"Try really hard."
"Do your best, and realize that your best is different than everyone else's."
"Be a nice person."
"Shoot for the moon, be happy if you land in the stars or whatever."
"Have fun in failure." (I stole that one from Gretchen Rubin's book The Happiness Project.)
So what do you think, does my campaign to #banperfect have any traction? #hashtagthis
1 comment:
I fully support this movement. I am in no way perfect nor do I expect to be and I often let others know that I am not too interested in perfecting anything anytime soon. I am more into striving for greater comfort and well being and joyful moments and an ever-improving me. I don't expect much more than that from anyone else either. I am pretty sure I use the word disaster WAY more often than perfect. 😉
Post a Comment