Finding Beauty in Imperfection

“Nobody is perfect”- we have heard this phrase millions of times throughout our lives. Let’s admit it, we may even have used this as an excuse at one point or another. Many people, who know me, would say I am slightly obsessive and a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to work. Although I do not think of myself as such, I would like to share my little self-reflection I had recently. So here it is: a Paint-for-Thought by a demi-Perfectionist.

Last year during the Circuit Breaker period in Singapore, even a person who is not into online shopping would fall victim to digital advertising. Consequently, I purchased serveral “Paint-by-Numbers” painting kits to kill my abundant free time. Little did I know it would be such a pain for a perfectionist, especially when you are an amateur painter. I sketch but have never dabbled in painting before (unless you count painting my own wall). You would have thought that it would be easy since all you have to do is follow the numbers and fill the paint accordingly. In actual fact, it was not that easy especially when it came to small empty spots that you need to fill. Some of the paint were hardened upon delivery too. Not surprisingly, I gave up after a few rounds, which was unlike myself.

Recently I picked up the unfinished painting again and was determined to finish it, thanks to Singapore moving into Phase Two (heightened alert). My painting journey has provided me with 3 lessons that all of us could relate to in our everyday lives.

1.     Let it go

When I first started with the painting, the only thing I had in my mind was to paint without smudging. I was too focused to do that my way and kept fixing whenever I accidently smudged out of the box. I took a lot of time fixing instead of painting. During my second try, I stopped fixing and let it be. The smudged edges fitted in nicely, and in fact gave an artistic look.

Be it being a perfectionist or not, most of us struggle between doing things “my” way or letting our partners/colleagues/staff do their own way. As everyone has their own benchmark of doing things, it may cause issues and bring about chaos when we have to work together. This is especially worse for perfectionists. Sometimes we invest too much time in perfecting one thing, or sometimes we insist people do things our way. Either way we end up spending too much time to get the result. What we tend to forget is all of us are working towards one common thing – the final result. It could be a work project, sales result, or even building a relationship. We turn to hold on to things instead of letting go and letting things fall into place. What if we try to compromise with one another, instead of trying to fix every little thing?

2.     Be bold

When I realised some the paint was hardened, I was disappointed. At first, I tried different methods to soften the paint but to no avail. I even thought of writing to the seller to make a complaint. I looked around for replacement as well. I am not artistic enough to know different shades of colours, and I definitely did not want to ruin my painting because I used colours different from the one prescribed. Thankfully, the white base and darker shades were fine. In the end, I dared myself to mix the paints and created my own variation of shades. Although they were different from the original, they were close enough to finish my painting.

As perfectionists, when we face a problem, one of the first things we tend to do is finding why that has happened. Then we will try to either fix it or restart the whole thing regardless of where we are. Just like cooking, we have to follow our exact recipe to deliver the dish. Even with a little bit of variation, we will start from scratch repeatedly until we get it right. Of course, sometimes we need to get the formula right but do we have to for every single thing in life? Instead of starting from scratch again or spending time figuring out what went wrong, we could put a little bit of salt and pepper to fix it up and move forward, or be bold enough to mix the colours and complete it. It might be different from what you have originally planned, but you would not know the result until you have tried.

3.      View from a far

After struggling with smudges and hardened paint, I finally finished my painting. The last lesson I have learnt is to accept just the way it is. So what if I could not fill the spots perfectly or get the colour exactly right? I am not Vincent van Gogh nor Pablo Picasso. I am not even an artist, let alone be the 21st century best artist. After all, neither myself nor anyone in my family is going to look at it up close and say, “Hey, how come here got smudge?” or “Your colours seem off here and your strokes are uneven”. At the end of the day, all these do not matter because it has been proudly hung on the wall in my bedroom to be admired from afar.

One of the qualities we have as perfectionist is being detail-oriented, some might even say we are “micro”. We tend to look at things so up close to make sure everything is according to the way it should be. When things are not going as we have planned, we get frustrated and upset. For our better mental health, sometimes we need to stop looking at things microscopically. We need to remember that what is we are aiming for the end-result. So what if we could blend in together like the colours in the painting by accepting individual values and letting go of things? And what if we stop finding fault in every turn and start seeing things from a bird’s-eye view? We can definitely achieve a beautiful painting together as long as we do not lose sight of our common goal.

At the end, one would say, “Hey it’s easy for you to say.” Well, the truth is, it definitely is not easy but it is not impossible as well. All we need is courage to step out of our comfort zone and be ready to accept the beauty we find in imperfection. I have always wanted to share my thoughts and write articles, but I have been scared to do so. The perfectionist part of me would always find excuses not to do it. But hey, here is my first write-up and it is definitely not perfect. Regardless, I hope you find some beauty in this imperfection.