Perfectly Imperfect
Perfectly Imperfect
As we wrap up this series on hospitable beauty (start here if you missed the first three posts), let’s take a look at the one thing most likely to keep us from creating something beautiful: Perfectionism.
Are you a perfectionist?
I have to frequently remind myself that beauty—at least the beauty humans create—is not about perfection. I am a recovering perfectionist. I have learned that perfectionism damages the soul and kills creativity. We must strive for excellence, of course, but a standard of perfection may mean that we never offer anything at all.
Nicholas Wilton, the founder of Artplane, imagines that someone once organized everything in the world into categories that made sense. After putting everything that made sense into its perfect place, there was a bunch of stuff that was left over. In frustration, this organizer threw everything that did not fit into a big box and labeled it ART. Wilton then writes,
Art, among all the other tidy categories, most closely resembles what it is like to be human. To be alive. It is our nature to be imperfect. To have uncategorized feelings and emotions. To make or do things that don’t sometimes necessarily make sense.
Art is all just perfectly imperfect.
Once the word Art enters the description of what you’re up to, it is almost like getting a hall pass from perfection. It thankfully releases us from any expectation of perfection.1
“We should all be set free from the toxic thinking that keeps us from wholeheartedly doing our best to create beauty because we think it has to be perfect.”
I think a good word to contrast against perfection is the word authentic. I once had a beautiful Fender Stratocaster guitar. It was nicked and scratched from use and travel. It was not perfect. But it was authentic. Authentic, in this regard, is better than perfect. We communicate the good and beautiful from what is true in the depths of our soul. Again, we must strive for excellence, but the beauty we create begins in our authentic selves—not our perfect selves. I have learned over the years that people tend to receive authenticity as beauty.
When we communicate from who we really are, it pleases something in people’s souls.
It’s like the multi-Grammy-award-winning hip-hop/R&B superstar who asked me to celebrate the fifteen-year renewal of his wedding vows, a huge—and extravagantly expensive—event for him and his wife. He wanted to send his tailor to make me a suit that would match his suit and the suit of the other men in his wedding party. The suit was not me. I said, hospitably, “No.”
When the big day arrived, I showed up at the venue dressed in the well-tailored—but by his standards boring—suit that I typically do weddings in. I was led to where he was waiting. He stood there, drink in hand, surrounded by his entourage. As I approached, he lowered his sunglasses and looked me up and down. Then he said in a hip-hop kind of way, “You look coo’, that’s why you my pastor.”
Well, I have seldom been accused of being “coo’.” Or cool. But somehow I was cool to him because I am just who I am. And somehow, though he is from a totally different world than I am in almost every way, he connects to that and receives what I wholeheartedly offer.
People find authenticity beautiful and when we try to do beautiful things out of a sincere heart, people respond to who we are. They resonate.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky described a woman who had aged, yet channeled beauty from deep in her heart:
Her face still kept the remnants of its former beauty, and besides, she looked much younger than her age, as almost always happens with women who keep their clarity of spirit, the freshness of their impressions, and the honest, pure ardor of their hearts into old age. Let us say parenthetically that keeping all this is the only means of preserving one’s beauty even in old age. Her hair was already thinning and starting to turn gray, little radiating wrinkles had long since appeared around her eyes, her cheeks were sunken and dry from worry and grief, and still her face was beautiful.2
This woman was beautiful because of who she was. Beauty begins in our soul. I intend to do everything in my power to create communicative environments that are pleasing to people’s physical senses. I intend to imagine and work and sacrifice to make that happen. I know that my every effort to communicate meaningful things—useful things—is more effective in any setting of beauty. But I will also remember that cultivating authenticity in my soul, and communicating out of who I am, is more important than any other attempt to do any beautiful thing.
The truest inner beauty can only come by God’s grace. Each of us who are children of God are indwelled by “the beauty of the Lord.” And more than anything else, that provides the basis for truly hospitable communication.
Because of this beauty endowed by God, we all can—if we want to—do beautiful things that honor God and lead people to something more.
The question is: Do you want to?
Are you also a recovering perfectionist? You’re not alone. Drop a comment and share what you’ve learned by letting go of your perfectionist tendencies.
1. Nicholas Wilton as quoted by Brené Brown in Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead (New York: Avery, 2012), 136
2. Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment (New York: Vintage, 1992), 206
Photo by Eric Parks on Unsplash
Adapted from The Hospitable Leader (Baker Publishing Group) by Terry A. Smith. All rights reserved.
Creating beauty is just part of being a hospitable leader. Download “The 5 Welcomes of Hospitality” to learn more about how to view life and leadership through the lens of hospitality. It’s a free download that is my gift to you. Learn more here.