Rags of Imperfection

Many years ago, I was a perfectionist.

Growing up, my parents always made us feel that if we made errors or got into trouble, we were shaming them. Like most children of Caribbean parents, I knew my parents had a hard life. I felt that after all they had suffered, I wanted to do anything to save them pain and to make up for it in a way.

I tried to be perfect in my childhood, through university, and into my career as a consultant. At the end of each day, I would lie awake at night reflecting on my day and groaning inwardly about every mistake, no matter how small. I relived everything I had done wrong in detail and felt sick. I looked for clues. When should I have realised it was going to go wrong? How could I have avoided it? How could I make up for it? I begged God to fix me.

At work I learnt that I had to be more tolerant of others. I became a good coach, I encouraged and supported others through their failures, and told them it was an opportunity to learn, but I held myself to a different standard. No matter how much people told me that I was too hard on myself I couldn’t hear it. I knew that if I could just discipline myself enough, work hard enough, try hard enough, that I would succeed.

I thought I could maintain the double standard of being supportive to others while being hard on myself. I was deceiving myself. My team took their cue from how I treated myself. They liked me, but they were always afraid of letting me down.

In my early thirties I was reading my bible, and I came across Isaiah 64:6 “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags” It was a turning point for me.

In Jamaican lingo, one of the most popular curse words is ‘blud clot’. Back in the day before sanitary napkins were available, women used strips of cloth or rags and made a bundle between their legs and then tied it around their waist. A women’s rags or blood cloths as they were called in Jamaica were considered the dirtiest thing ever. For one, blood stains especially if left on clothing to dry and harden. People back then didn’t have access to bleach and other stain removers so even though they washed the cloths, they always were stained. When a Jamaican man told a woman to ‘move ya blud clot’. He was deeply shaming her. He was telling everyone that she was menstruating and that generally meant that her perspiration was stronger and that she smelled. No one would want her to sit on their chairs in case she leaked.

It was during that reflection that I finally realised what Isaiah was saying. When we think we are doing our best and making ourselves perfect, it’s like washing our menstrual rags and then presenting them to God. He with his perfect vision can still see the stains of our sins and smell them. Can you imagine coming before any king let alone God and saying, I bought you some cloth you can use and then he opens it to find used menstrual cloths with stains. Sound abhorrent right? I stopped telling people that I was a perfectionist.

As I reflected on the revelation, I came to realise that Jesus’s blood is the only stain remover that can get rid of the stench and stains of sins. Believing you can be perfect is being arrogant enough to believe that you can clean up your stains better by yourself than using Jesus’ blood.

I realised that I was trying to be perfect for God, the way I had tried to be perfect for my parents. But in my humanity, that simply was not possible to do. Understanding that Jesus’s death atoned for my mistakes, was key for me letting go of perfectionism. I realised that we will always fall short, but Jesus not only cleansed us, but he filled in the gaps.

I started telling myself that I needed to reach my greatest best, each and every time. But that was just perfectionism in another form. Eventually I came to understand that if I rated my attempt at any task on a scale of 1 being my worst and 10 being my best ever. Doing my best didn’t mean I had to be a 10 every time. Some days I would be a 10 but other days, I might be tired or busy and my best might be an 8 or a 6 and that was ok too. Letting go of perfectionism was like being released from a pressure cooker.

That is why I don’t believe in perfectionism. It’s a lie and it’s a trap. Whenever, I find myself trying to do anything, write a paper, complete a project in my own strength, I picture me bringing a box of used menstrual cloths before the king. That stops me in my tracks.

That revelation made more accepting of myself and others. Now the coaching that I gave others isn’t just for them, it’s for me too. Now when I reflect on my day, I focus on what went well. I acknowledge my errors sometimes, but I don't dwell on. I trust that Jesus will fill the gap.