per·fec·tion / pərˈfekSH(ə)n/ – the condition, state, or quality of being free or as free as possible from all flaws or defects.
The idea of being perfect once offered me something finite – a finish, closure, an end. It was something I could strive for and achieve. An expected goal. It was an old familiar feeling and very comfortable, however it was a form of imprisonment.
Freedom from flaws was a hard task, restrictive and near impossible. It was like the Geisha, living a life of controlled gestures, highly skilled and pleasing others.
Striving for perfection is demanding, exhausting and all consuming: driven by an external force of never feeling enough and always keeping it together.
But what if there is no perfection in life and nature – only cycles? Cycles impulse around and around, they are naturally and forevermore expanding and evolving, there is no end to these cycles. There is no stagnation, only change.
Can we measure perfection? Being perfect at a task, by the way we look, by what we do, say or think?
Perhaps we cannot measure perfection because we are forever evolving? This means that there must be change in everything we think, do and express. We are forever expanding and can always go deeper… in our conversations, our movements, in our connection with self.
What if our expression in life will never be perfect and nor should it be; perhaps being perfect is just a concept we have hung onto, thinking that in some way it made us ‘better’ or more lovable.
In the past, believing the idea of perfection pushed me to improve, achieve, to try, and to separate from my natural flow and beauty as a woman. In choosing to try to be perfect it often took me so far away from myself that I felt disconnected from life and my inner feelings.
Being a perfectionist felt like I had no sense of humour; it felt like wearing a suit of armour and having tightly bound feet, restrictive and joyless. It was seemingly protecting me from the hurts of the world, but really it blocked the love within me from expressing outwards.
Perfectionism held me back from being my gorgeous, playful, fluid and powerful self. In many ways trying to be perfect has prevented me from truly connecting with others, never allowing myself to feel unravelled, exposed and free to walk my own path. I have been lost in the illusion that ‘I am only worthy of love if I am perfect’. This simply is not true.
The truth is that I am not perfect and deep within me is a knowing that this is okay… as there is no such thing as perfection.
Imperfection is real, fresh, sexy and alive in its fullness and is ever-changing.
I no longer choose to be a perfectionist. I am unwinding the tightly bound beliefs of this imposition. I am slipping out of the corset and straitjacket of glamour and unhinging the ‘love blocking’ suit of armour. I have removed the facade and taken off the mask. Every day I feel more light and lovely – I am now enjoying appreciating myself without the need to be perfect.
In fact, I feel the true beauty within me that is strong, still, powerful and forever evolving. I now know who I am. I am an extraordinarily beautiful Woman just being myself, and there is no room for perfection in that. I am worthy of the deep love that flows from within me and is expressed out to the world every single day. I celebrate this love and appreciate all that I am without perfection.
Imperfection allows growth and unfoldment, movement and magic in every moment. It has its own Divine order and greater plan, in which I now trust. I am imperfectly perfect.
I am deeply and forevermore inspired by the teachings of Serge Benhayon, Natalie Benhayon, Universal Medicine and The Ageless Wisdom.
By Kathryn Fortuna, Inner Image Consultant
Further reading:
Accepting Your Imperfections and Grandness
Whoops Is One Of My Favourite Words – A Message From the Author
The Truth about Serge Benhayon 
It was great to read this blog again, as there are many layers that have to be exposed in being perfect. It kind of feels that it is related to controlling too as we want and need it to be a certain way. Whether it be given to us from our upbringing or an expectation from society or media. We have conformed in this throughout our lives and this has to come to an end at some point. And as already shared, a “cycle”.
When we truly understand a cycle, we can truly appreciate what is on offer because in that appreciation we are offered a healing, a freeing that can’t be described or put into words.
It’s ok to not be perfect…
Kathryn we spend our entire lives, trying to look perfect, pretzeling ourselves to fit in and in all of that, we become exhausted, damaged or taking on a personality that is truly not us.
Within all of us is a core, and that core is the pacemaker of life. It is the spark that impulse life into us, and us into life. That spark is always within us, buried underneath the rubbish that has been piled onto us. Our role is to stay connected to this spark, with no added complication and keeping everything simple. Recognising what belongs and what does not and if we lived from there, then life will be different, if we choose it to be…
Who/what says to us what is perfect and what isn’t? And by what measures is it, that it is perfect? We need to question everything we are faced with in our lives, as it isn’t what it all seems and appear in front of our eyes. For our eyes only see what it wants to see, when we can see and feel much more than our senses can.
I agree – an idea of perfection forces to bring in a picture of something finite where the very basis of existence is a constant expansion.
So perfectionism is a trap, as we are forever evolving, ‘This means that there must be change in everything we think, do and express. We are forever expanding and can always go deeper… in our conversations, our movements, in our connection with self.’
Fumiyo these pictures are representing perfection, and in that perfection, we are restricted, contracted, pretzeled, and so far away from who we truly are. It is an image that cannot and will not sustain us. Why not expand as life unfolds? Everyone is given this opportunity.
One more comment as I am on a roll…Ideals and beliefs and pictures of how things should be, how we should look, how others should be, how others should look etc abound. And each person has a different version of the same larger flavor of this illusion, and the flavor keeps changing. It is a very challenging albeit refreshing approach to ditch all we have been sold, and to surrender to the no pictures, the no ideals and no beliefs of the Soul.
What if true perfection is about understanding and applying/living the art of imperfection? Busting the roles of perfection that we think are to be strived for but instead it’s the very roles of perfection that take us away from our essence which is the only perfection that we could have, hold and express.
Perfection and control really go hand in hand – you cannot have one without the other. We strive, we seek, we reject so much that which may in quality be amazing but does not appear physically perfect. This happens when we make it about the outside and how things look rather than making it about the connection within and how we feel
Perfection is something we are often taught to aspire towards, but what if there is no perfection in the physical – but only perfection regarding our expression?
What if there is no true perfection in the physical, perfectionism is too exhausting, ‘Striving for perfection is demanding, exhausting and all consuming: driven by an external force of never feeling enough and always keeping it together.’
This sentence caught my attention today
“I am worthy of the deep love that flows from within me and is expressed out to the world every single day. I celebrate this love and appreciate all that I am without perfection.”
It was the words ”
I am worthy of deep love” which is something we deny ourselves having fallen for the belief that only someone else can give you that love such as God this is a lie because we are a part of God so he is always with us as we are always with him as we are made of the same particles that make up the universe.
When we strive for perfection we are striving for an illusion which does not exist and consequently can never be achieved and hence a feeling of failure.
jstewart51, these are wise words – perfection is a chase of the shadows, of something that does not exist but will distract us from our true purpose of living imperfectly the perfection that lies within.
Love this, “.. our true purpose of living imperfectly the perfection that lies within.”
We are imperfectly perfect.
“Perhaps we cannot measure perfection because we are forever evolving?” Absolutely, and it makes perfect sense that because we are ever changing and evolving there can’t actually be perfection because there is no end point. The other thing about the lie of perfection is in how dismissive it is of everything someone already is, of all their beautiful qualities. We chase after images of perfection believing ourselves so flawed when actually there is a great beauty and richness within every human being.
We can appreciate the imperfections and continual learning and evolving of the human being while knowing the perfection and oneness with God in our essence.
Appreciating ourselves for who we are, ‘Every day I feel more light and lovely – I am now enjoying appreciating myself without the need to be perfect.’
‘I am an extraordinarily beautiful Woman just being myself’ When I read these words I can see the inherent pictures about what a beautiful woman should be and the beliefs of being arrogant by expressing that in this world…however what I can feel in my body is just the opposite, an exquisite humbleness in accept the true and natural beauty in you Kathryn. Thanks for sharing
When we observe from our heart there is no right or wrong, no place to go, nothing to achieve…from the complete beings we already are we see and understand life…how amazing is that.
At this moment I’m appreciating being perfectly imperfect and being able to embrace this fact. Seeing myself without judgment, with the clarity of a little child, feeling the same innocence to observe myself it’s a blessing, something very beautiful to experience and to develop in our daily life.
Perfectionism is one of the biggest kill-joys around.
Absolutely, perfectionism kills our natural joy, ‘Being a perfectionist felt like I had no sense of humour; it felt like wearing a suit of armour and having tightly bound feet, restrictive and joyless.’
Striving for perfection is the ultimate distraction of what is here in the moment because there is always something to appreciate and embrace in the moment and if we don’t we can never truly move to the next moment in full.
Of course as we live in a world where we have limited our love to be for one or some few individuals whilst it has to be our every way – as the love is felt in all that we are, when we allow ourselves to be truly. Our love can then come out easily.
‘Imperfection is real, fresh, sexy and alive in its fullness and is ever-changing.’ And allows us to be confident, and lets not forget, joyfull! And I would never have imagined that I would say that having strived for perfection for a long long time.
I say yes to being perfectly imperfect.
Perfection is therefore an endless unreal thing that is of interruption of our every expanding imperfection (love).
Beautifully said, when there is no end striving to be perfect is set up to fail.
This article reminds me about the standards that one has and chooses to live by. And how standards can be a set of tick boxes to be achieved, or how they can be the daily choices and movements that we make which confirm our values.
Our standards are never fixed but constantly in movement to raise, expand the awareness we live by.
Imperfection gives us the freedom to align to the flow of evolution.
Perfection is a straightjacket that confines us to picture of how we should be.
That’s exactly it, it is an incredibly cruel and restrictive consciousness. We aspire after images of perfection but it’s actually a very abusive energy.
Could it be that perfection is a word that is given to us coming from society that makes it all about doing things right and how things look? Perfection seems to be a finished end state, while the Universe is constantly expanding and never finished.
The crucial word is flaw. If we go by images of what flaw is, we are jailed for life because we will always running behind it, trying to catch up.
What a set up it is to have us striving to be perfect! It is ridiculous when you stop and read this article and reflect on what this actually does to us. But that is the game is it not, for us to think we need to be a certain way so that we are anything but the grandness of who we truly are.
Aiming for perfection only sets us up to fail and to have dissatisfaction with ourselves and our lives.
Evolution is a constant movement. There is nowhere to arrive at. What I can feel is our resistance to this constant movement of foreverness. Accepting imperfection feels like giving a big nod to this movement, riding with God’s rhythm. It is not allowing or defending ‘untruth’. Our willingness to give truth a go, even though it may not be the absolute truth and could at times be far from it, knowing that is not the absolute truth, but accepting where we are humanly at, is very much worth appreciating.
Understanding the nature of evolution/expansion allows us to accept imperfection and why there are many ones to make up the One, and I am feeling even more so lately that this requires a completely different posture and movement from the one we are so familiar with otherwise a ‘truth’ is put at a risk of becoming another picture of perfection which can be held as an unforgiving ax of perfectionism to attack others who do not fit in the picture or ‘not true’, and those identified untruths (imperfection) are often left with no space for a truer breath to enter and move differently, and what I often observe is either withdrawal or retaliation becomes the likely reaction.
As you say perfection has the implication of completion, hence it is impossible to achieve as nothing is permanent for we are perpetually evolving. However, this does not mean we are not perfect when in Truth.
It’s revelatory and confirming to read this line, especially the bit about never allowing myself to feel unravelled i.e. to be raw and sensitive – ‘In many ways trying to be perfect has prevented me from truly connecting with others, never allowing myself to feel unravelled, exposed and free to walk my own path.’
I am always feeling a lot and now that I have a known marker of the stillness within, that is continually deepening, most of the time much feels out of place. It’s the integration of the two worlds. The stillness within is perfection and knowing I have this within it becomes my duty to perfect my connection to the best of my ability.
In a session this week a practitioner told me I was perfectly imperfect in most areas and then shared one area I could bring a little more attention to. The thing is that the comment in relation to being perfectly imperfect was a huge compliment – meaning pretty much as good as it gets because there is no perfection on this planet!
It will be a truly glorious day when we all get that there is no perfection – no set, steely images of how it should be that completely stop the divine flow of life and our surrender to the beautiful, pure, powerful Light and Love from which we come. Holding onto perfection literally stops us from evolving.
Yes Lyndy, it will be perfect day 😉
Yes / we are merely at the influence of ideals and beliefs that keep us limited to the truth. That keep us seeing only superficial, whilst it is actually multidimensional.
What is being said here is true, I have been playing a game of perfection for so long and now opening myself up to the fact that it does not actually exist on this plane of life. So striving for it is utterly false. “Imperfection is real, fresh, sexy and alive in its fullness and is ever-changing.”
I am still realising every day even more the brutality of the straight-jacket of perfectionism – and how it wounds so many young people at school, and then stays as a life long pattern of imprisonment. It holds the impossible picture than people imagine that they cannot break but must match. But only by smashing that icon can we access the glory of true life – the vitality, the livingness, the joy, the love, and everything that constitute God.
I feel how self appreciation is a big part of undoing the stranglehold of perfectionism, as the appreciation forms a relationship to what is already there within us and brings it forward. In perfectionism we often believe we are nothing so we begin to strive to be something. In appreciation we become aware of our beauty and know it is already formed, already within us, and appreciation magnifies it supporting our connection to ourselves and the daily expression of our qualities, which in my experience feels quite joyful.
Perfectionism keeps us in a constant spin, always striving for more and never feeling we measure up, learning to let this pattern go is life changing and allows us the space to appreciate and accept the unique qualities we all bring.
There is this constant feeling of not being enough when we strive for perfection, like you say a constant spin and definitely not coming from the notion we are already everything.
There are a qualities that can honour yourself in full and for me it is having ‘perfection’ in my order. This creates steadiness and a flow to life being ready for the what is next. This is done in the knowing that perfection is not possible but having the order holds it in place – perfection in the imperfection.
Sometimes I am in absolute awe of how much I can learn about both myself and others from my imperfections.
“Imperfection allows growth and unfoldment, movement and magic in every moment. It has its own Divine order and greater plan, in which I now trust. I am imperfectly perfect.” how beautiful, amazing and expansive it is to be perfectly imperfect. no more pictures ideals or beliefs it is just to be who we truly are within the flow of life.
Over the past few years of attending presentations by Serge Benhayon it has been possible to begin discarding the hard suit of perfectionism. Everything feels much lighter without this massive heavy load and thus aware of an amazing vulnerability, delicateness and a deeper appreciation of being in a woman’s body, from making this choice..
“I no longer choose to be a perfectionist. I am unwinding the tightly bound beliefs of this imposition. I am slipping out of the corset and straitjacket of glamour and unhinging the ‘love blocking’ suit of armour. I have removed the facade and taken off the mask. Every day I feel more light and lovely – I am now enjoying appreciating myself without the need to be perfect.”
Striving for perfection is itself an imperfection
Perfection does feel very stagnant and the tension to achieve perfection feels very restrictive because anything outside of that rigid picture of perfection is not accepting. The most fun and joy I have had in life is when I haven’t cared about perfection and feeling free with my imperfections.
I love how you unravel that there is no perfection as we are continually evolving and thus we are not static but always asked to be ‘more’.
‘free from all flaws or defects’ … oddly for someone who’s chased perfection I’ve not read it’s definition, and yet reading it today I feel it’s futility, it’s chasing a point in time, locking it in as perfect and in that it becomes staid; there is no flow, no light, no grace, but a prison. So here’s to letting go more of my perfectionism and seeing it’s hold on the way and flow of life that is the natural grace we all are.
Yes, isn’t that with so many things in life we pursue? We pursue them and often with fervour because we are convinced of them being the way to go, but if we stopped and felt we would see that there was a discrepancy in what we really deep down want as to how we are living.
We conflate perfection with something that is relatable to our five senses. What if perfection is an existing quality but one that we cannot relate to it through our limited five senses? What if the issue is not with perfection but with what we are perfection to be (which has nothing to do with what we make out of it)? What if perfection is not a human quality but only a divine one?
Perfection demands such an ongoing, ‘doing’, tense, effort – all of which is absolutely exhausting. Doing a beautiful job on something with love and in the flow of movement may have its imperfections but it feels so much more loving, and it is totally regenerating.
Anything we think we must attain, is a reduction and not a true reflection of the All that we already stupendously are.
We can’t have perfection because we are constantly evolving and expanding so it only exists when we create a picture of how we want to be. Which is impossible to start with because we are constantly expanding and can’t fit in a box or a picture!
I am starting to understand that perfection is impossible to achieve because it doesn’t exist in the universe and so, no wonder it is so exhausting and debilitating whenever we strive for perfection.
Perfection is like a long-term prison sentence of uncertain duration, only ever relieved by short bursts of light when a moment of assumed perfection momentarily breaks the shackles of judgment and devastation.
We are forever students in a way that leaves us with imperfections deliberately so. We are not here to be here, let alone be perfect in being here. Hence all imperfections are showing us something.. To forever deepening it goes.
Beautifully said Danna. Interesting that we have allowed this word to own us to the degree that we are missing the point, that in essence we are already everything. Our imperfections serve to guide us to live in a truer way, so we can heal and evolve. A blessing for us to embrace, as it is all about being true, being love and as you shared there is no end to deepening our connection to all that we are and all that we are returning to.
Funny to read you commenting on perfection Carola, because today I was listening to your CD in the car and thought that was pure perfection. Before hearing you sing I too knew there was no such thing as perfection but now I am not so sure.
ah ha just read your comment again and got it – of course you sing with love from your essence and anything expressed for there is perfect even if it is not!
”In choosing to try to be perfect it often took me so far away from myself that I felt disconnected from life and my inner feelings.”
Absolutely, that is what it does — it makes you focus on achieving something that is not achievable and than you are left by the lack of awareness of the bigger picture, of you in it — and hence we often loose connection to life and our inner feelings (that is such important part of you).
“perhaps being perfect is just a concept we have hung onto, thinking that in some way it made us ‘better’ or more lovable.” I absolutely agree as this is a belief that many children take on very early in their lives – ‘if I am a good boy/girl mummy will love me’. What a weight for a young child to take on and one that could possibly stay with them all their lives. Understanding that there is no perfection was, to me, like throwing off a weighted down coat followed by the most amazing sense of liberation from the damaging restrictions of the past.
Perfection does not allow true freedom as you say Kathryn, as it dictates how we have to be to the dot. And how could that be possibly be freedom. So I like how you say you are imperfectly perfect as when we are in our essence that’s who we are and it is never about completing a picture that we have of how we have to be but living and expressing from our inner knowing and quality.
It’s like in music… If you are locked into perfection, as so many musicians are, there is so much tension there is so much pressure… to the point where, the lead violinist of the Brandenburg Orchestra would repeatedly jab himself with a needle before it came time to do an important solo… Imagine what it’s like to let go of this and to simply have fun playing and singing together… What a contrast
So true, there is a lot of tension when we aim for perfection, it is a constant need to be better and you give a great example how extreme our behaviour can be pushed under this belief of having to be exact to the point.
Yes seeing perfection as an end or completion of some kind is a trap, for perfection is not possible in terms of living as a harmonious human being. Hence we are in the illusion of thinking we are chasing something attainable all to avoid appreciating what is available to us in the present moment…
Kathryn, you share some points that carry such depth of truth that it is unavoidable such as this One: ‘I have been lost in the illusion that ‘I am only worthy of love if I am perfect’. This simply is not true.’
Many of us carry around with this or certain ideals based on pure lies — look a like truths or made to portray the falsity over the reality.. All once allowed by us — by not standing within our truth and gaining a certain force power in the other (evil). This is not true intelligence — awareness is.