In case you’re new to this blog, I’ve shared that I am a “recovering perfectionist.” Perfectionism wastes time, energy, money, kills relationships and stalls businesses. Having said that, every perfectionistic leaning I have was challenged yesterday by a training perfect storm. This is what my morning felt like yesterday. Okay, perhaps not this bad, but you get the point:
The scene: It’s 7:00 am and I am excitedly getting out of the house to start round 2 of Sanera Boot Camp. It’s a brand new class with brand new people and I can’t wait. But there is a problem. I did not get confirmation from my local Kinko’s (yes, this Kinko’s) that my color print job was complete. I knew they opened at 7:00 am so I thought I’d call them on my 45 minute commute just to confirm.
I called and no one answered. Weird. I called again and no one answered. Strange. I called again and no one answered. Frustrated. I called again and no one answered. Angry. I figured the employee who thinks opening at 7:00 am means showing up at 7:00 am and opening the doors to customers at 7:10 am is the same employee who was not answering the phone.
After calling for 30 minutes straight with no answer, I was scared. Class started at 9:00 am and I had no confirmation about my materials. Not good. I went into disaster prevention mode. I’m fortunate enough to have a fabulous training intern (Michelle Poteet who is also a professional organizer) helping me with this class. I gave her a call, let her know what was going on and asked her to meet me at the Kinko’s so I could give her all the welcome information to hand out to the class while I waited for the materials to be done. No problem; disaster averted.
At this point it’s 7:45 am and I realized my lips were chapped, I reached over to my purse to get some lipstick. Problem -- there was no purse. I checked the back seat. There was no purse. There was no purse. There was no purse!!! I left my purse at home. I was 45 minutes from home and there was no way I would have enough time to go back and get it. Now I had no materials, no wallet, no money to pay for the materials that probably weren’t done and chapped lips.
I called Michelle again, jokingly asking her if she knew of a professional organizer and explained what happened. She graciously offered to pay for the materials and let me reimburse her.
Did I mention it was the first day of a brand new class for Boot Camp?
At 7:55 am, someone at Kinko’s finally answered. When I asked them what was going on, they said, and I quote, “We opened an hour late due to inclement weather.” What inclement weather? There was a tiny bit of rain and sleet in San Antonio and there were itty bitty snow flurries that did not stick to the ground -- the day before! There was NO inclement weather! This is San Antonio people, not Niagra Falls! (#purosanantonio)
I get to Kinko’s, Michelle is there and they are working on my materials. Thankfully, they were ready in less than ten minutes, Michelle paid and we were on our way to the event center. It was still early and with a sigh of relief, I knew everything would be okay.
Scene 2: The room looked beautiful, I was ready and people started coming in. We were welcoming them, helping them get situated and someone asked me what we were having for breakfast. I walked over to the chaffing dishes, lifted one of the lids and unlike the contents of Aunt Lucille’s hat box in Crazy in Alabama, there was nothing in it -- except steam. There was no food… I’m pretty sure I stood there for at least 3 seconds staring at steam where food should have been before I mustered the best smile I could, turned around and said, “We seem to be missing some food. Help yourself to coffee and fruit and I will figure out what happened.” I walked away and spoke with the only employee I could find and said as calmly and as quietly as I could, “We have no food.” He, stared at me and in a decidedly not-calm voice said, “I know” and left the room. 15 minutes later we had food.
Did I mention it was the first day of a brand new class for Boot Camp?
There was a time in my life, not too long ago, when just one of these issues would have thrown me into orbit. A year ago, I would have gotten angry, panicked, melted down and it would have ruined my day not to mention ruined the presentation.
What changed? I’ve surround myself with friends who help me not take myself too seriously (thank you Michael and Linda). I’ve worked hard on giving myself permission to fail. I diligently work at redefining what failure is. I publicly poke fun at myself (like in this post). And I remind myself that God does not ever expect perfectionism.
Rejecting perfectionism is one of the most stress-relieving, freeing things you can do. Will you reject perfectionism with me?
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Wow, what a day Alicia. I would have had wanted to have a meltdown myself but maybe settled for a chocolate candy bar. lol Thank you for sharing that story, it is something that can and will happen to all of us and I hope when it does I will remember this story and that it is okay to not be perfect. Have I told you lately that you rock?
Hi Patty! It has taken a loooong time for me to get there. Because perfectionism has been ingrained in me since childhood, I realized that if I wanted to get over it, I had to active about it not passive. PS – You rock too!
This is the PERFECT blog to read on a Monday. If my day starts looking bad I’ll just take a look at my purse and be thankful I didn’t forget it! Thanks for sharing!
Wow Alicia! What a day!
Also, thank you for sharing your story about perfectionism. Soooo many of my clients have the same tendencies toward perfectionism and putting too much pressure on themselves. Your post is going to help a lot of people!
Rachel – I’m so glad you are encouraged! Welcome to the Sanera blog family!
Shana – thank you for your comment! I see perfectionism almost like a virus. It spreads, invades our brain cells and then paralyzes us. I’m glad you are out there encouraging your clients to reject perfectionism. And it’s so good to have you in the Sanera blog family!
This is great Alicia!
The funny thing about stressful situations is that they are usually funny once they are over
What an excellent story to share with everyone!
Michael
Alicia,
At least you had your phone!
I’m not a perfectionist but it sounds like a challenging day for anyone! Glad you got thru it with minimal trauma and a good attitude.
Michael, thank you for your comment! It is wonderful to be in a place where I can laugh and I actually laughed about it while it was happening. And thank you for being my un-perfectionist mentor!
Krista – I love it! Yes I did have my phone. That day would have been much worse without it!
To everyone – Michael Long, the friend I mentioned in the blog post above, wrote his own article about perfectionism. Check it out at http://www.theredrecruiter.com/random/perfectly-inspired/ .
Wow, what a day. I couldn’t stop reading because I was waiting for the, “…and then I lost my cool…” moment. It never came, and for that I am so impressed Alicia. There were at least five places in your tale where I would have gone red. Learning from you yet again my friend.
Mark – Don’t be too impressed yet! We’ll see if I can keep my cool the next time something like that happens! It is a great blessing that we learn from each other! Thank you for your comment and welcome to the Sanera family Mark!
Alicia, I follow you and Michael and always enjoy what you have to say. Today is no exception.
Aim for perfection, settle for excellence.
And some days, simply be thankful it wasn’t worse.
Keep doing great work,
jeff
Jeff – Fantastic quote! “Aim for perfection, settle for excellence and some days, simply be thankful it wasn’t worse.” Have a great day!
Alicia,
What a resonating post! You provided an illustrative, personalized story that is an example for all of us to follow next time we find ourselves in crisis mode –> and we WILL land there, again, it’s inevitable, as WE do not have complete control of ourselves, others and the world around us!
A good reminder that no one is an island, and also that we ‘do’ have control for our choices, and you have CHOSEN to surround yourself with complementary friends who help balance out your responses and to whom you can ‘reach out’ when needed (and they may reach out to you).
As well, the idea of ‘redefining what failure is’ important enough to be read twice. I’ve been working on redefining failure for myself these past few years, and your article reinforces why this is so critical in maintaining momentum, hope, positivity and resilience!