Ep.018 Sidestepping Perfection

Do you strive for perfection in your creative work only to find it sucks the joy out of the process or keeps you from accomplishing more in your life? Perfectionism, for all that we are feed the idea the we need to be as perfect as possible, can get in the way of attaining your version of success, if not be down right ruinous for you and your art.

In this episode, I discuss the ways perfectionism presents itself, why it’s problematic, why we do this to ourselves, and ways to combat it so you can, hopefully, increase your awareness of possibly problematic levels of perfectionism, and help you sidestep any ingrained need to avoid the beauty and opportunity that can be found in imperfection.

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CREDITS:

Cover design by Sage; Illustration by Olga KostenkoMusic

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Transcription

(AI transcribed, unedited. Please excuse the copious errors.)

It’s also the issue that we, as artists, envision what our work could be, but we don’t always think about what it just needs to be.  

Hello my beautiful fabulous friends out there. Thank you for joining me on the Sage Arts podcast. I’m sage, coming to you solo from the 10th. Use Arts headquarters, otherwise known as My Home studio. I’m in my usual closet like podcast room right off the home studio here in Southern California, enjoying a very sunny day. It’s warming up finally out here, drying out a bit after. Months and months of rain, which is. Just really weird for. Just usually Mother Nature. Just. Spits at us for a Couple of months and then leaves us alone for another 10 and we never see like hardly a cloud in the sky, which is why some people like Southern California. I love the change in weather, so initially I enjoyed all this rain but it is getting a little bit much so it’s also shut down a lot of my hiking trails and places that I. Like to go outdoors. Because it was just so muddy. There’s just so much rain. There’s plants dying, there’s trees falling, there’s hillsides coming down, there’s houses coming down with those hillsides, unfortunately. But there’s been so much rain. It’s really. Really funny. The other day I read about a park near us that decided to work with the kind of flooding that we’re getting and actually turned one of the fields into a lake and are now giving canoe lessons. So that’s just how rainy of the season we’ve had. But yeah, we’re OK here. Our Creek is kind of more of like a river. But it’s beautiful and. We’re really enjoying that part and soon we’ll have a new yard. We’re going to work on landscaping our yard. Both Brett and I are going to do what we can as far as the landscaping design. We don’t know anything about plants or whatnot, but we’re going to start doing mosaics for the yard. So I’m super excited about that. You know, we’re just trying to get in our artistic touch wherever we can. So that’s what’s going on here. I haven’t got anything exciting in terms of food and beverages to share with you right now. I’ve been having some issues with my eyes and. My throat. Which? Is terrible cause I use those all the time. But so I’m just sticking with water today and I’ve been snacking. On jicama which? Is if you don’t know, it’s a very crisp and. Juicy root vegetable. It’s slightly sweet and it’s kind of a great healthy substitute for things like crackers or whatnot. If you’re having a hankering for something crunchy. So try jicama. It’s spelled JICAMA, but great healthy snack if you can find that around. Try it out. If you’re in your studio and you’re sitting down to work, that’s fantastic. I love to hear that I get to go in and sit with you while you create if you are otherwise listening to me and you want to mentally kind of come. Into my studio. With me, you are more than welcome. So today we’re going to talk about a subject matter that is, well, pretty problematic for me. And it’s one of the reasons I wanted. To share it with you. I’ve actually been trying to work out my issues with the subject of perfectionism. It’s something that was ingrained in me since I was very young. And it’s becoming a real problem. And the primary reason it’s become a problem is because I spend so much time trying to make things as perfect as possible that I’m losing out on the opportunities to do other things, and we’re going to talk about what that means today. But before we really get into this, let me. Just do a quick shout out, actually wanted to shout out to. Trey Chavez for a while now. He has been cheerleading me on since the beginning. He sends me regular comments letting me know what episodes he likes. And Trey, thank you so much for that feedback. I want to know what’s hitting those buttons. For you. So, Trey, thank you for being one of those folks that are constantly out there doing that for me. And if you, my listeners want to do some cheerleading for me and who doesn’t need that right, you can contact me through the website at the sagearts.com, go to the contact page. There’s an e-mail form and there’s a voice message button. A little red button that says leave me a message. If you want to cheer me on by helping me monetarily, that certainly tells me that you value what I’m doing. So if you want to give back that way, you can find a. Buy me a coffee or PayPal donation button halfway down the homepage of the sagearts.com website. You can also go to my publisher site where I have my books and magazines and stuff. The polymer arts and I’m also selling stickers for the podcast there. That’s 10th musearts.com, so 10th is spelled out TENTH, 10th Muse Arts. Also don’t forget to follow me on Instagram and Facebook. Those pages are the Sage Arts podcast. So at the Sage Arts Podcast you can find me there and don’t miss out on future episodes. Go ahead and hit that follow button. If you are listening through a podcast player, you can also sign up for the once a week newsletter that just reminds you with a new episode is about also gives you. Additional material if there’s something to be associated with that week’s episode, and that’s also on the homepage of the sagearts.com, this little teal green button that says news and notices. So that’s the business for today. Let’s just jump right into the subject. Today, as you’re listening, just ask yourself whether you think perfection is an issue that you have, whether being perfect, trying to achieve perfection, especially in your creative work or actually anything, really. If it gets in the way. Or not, we’ll. Go through the ways this might present itself, why it can be problematic, why we do this to ourselves, and some ways to combat it. So you can hopefully increase your awareness of possibly problematic levels of perfectionism and help you get past any of that kind of ingrained stuff. I want to start first with an argument for imperfection. Let’s talk about why imperfection is something that we want. Think about the media that you take in movies and books and podcasts and whatnot, especially fictional stuff, because we find people fictional otherwise and connect to them based on what we see as similar based on what is familiar to us. We are drawn to that familiarity, so think of a character or a show in a book. That you really are drawn to. Chances are they are not perfect. People, they are fallible, they make mistakes. They do stupid things, they do selfish things, they hurt people. But they have redeeming qualities, right? So we are not drawn to perfection in the characters and things that we feel connected to the things that bring us back to that show in those books over and over again. We are drawn to the humanity of the characters. We are drawn to the fallibility of those people that are just like us. And so my argument for imperfection is why do we want to present things as per? To people who. Are looking for. And often feel more connected to the things that are imperfect out in the world. The things that reflect our humanity. I think if our work is so perfect, it’s going to keep a distance between the viewer and the work, you know, kind of like these things are so perfect. I can’t touch that. It’s just something that I’m going to look at and not. Feel like I can ever do or I. Never equate the things that I do with. I hope this makes sense. Basically imperfection represents humanity and humanity is what most of us are after in the things that we are most attracted to. The things that we are most drawn to, right, so that’s kind of like the base argument for why I think imperfection is actually not just something you should. Go ahead and let happen, but that you should actually aim for in many cases and also talk about some cultural imperfection embracing kind of later in this conversation. And I think it’s super interesting. Some of the stories I’ll tell you about that. First of all, let me talk about where I’m coming from when it comes to perfection. This is not something I have had a lot of successful experience with in terms of getting past it. I have been working on it a. Lot lately so I thought this would be an opportunity to bring you along and have you discover for yourself those things that might be helpful for dealing with perfectionism. And one of the things I’ve been really trying to drill into my head is that just because something could be better doesn’t mean I should try to make it better. And I know that sounds weird cause that’s not really how we’re taught, but there’s some really good reasons to realize things don’t need to be better just because you can make them better. And we’ll talk about that. So as an example, I’m. Going to pull back a. Curtain here. Kind of let you into a little. I don’t know if. It’s a secret or. But when I started out. This podcast I used. To script every single word of the solo podcast. I was afraid of making mistakes. I was afraid of missing points, of not giving you a structured conversation that could be easily followed. But in the past month or so I’ve been listening. And editing these interviews that they’ve had and the episodes that I do. With Brett and. There’s such organic conversations and they’re really wonderful and they’re not scripted. And yet the points are there and the things I need to get across are there and the things my guests want to get across are there, and there’s no scripting. So why am I scripting my solo shows? Because I’ve noticed this is a huge issue. How much time I spend preparing the scripts and then doing the audio recording and then? Editing the audio recording and I’m spending the entire week Monday through Thursday, Monday through Friday, sometimes into Saturday when it runs late doing this podcast and that was not my intention when I started doing this, I went through some initial test runs I thought I could. Do this very quickly until. I realize all the things that I could do to make this as perfect as. Possible, but what I’m doing is I’m taking time away from the other things that I love to do. So I’ve been working on trying to let go of that need to make things better, to make things perfect. So I did some soul searching, some digging into my background to really find out where this came from, and I do think there’s things in my background that I. Personally struggle with. And we’ll all have our own versions of this, our own stories of where our penchant for perfectionism like. Come from so for. In my household, accomplishments weren’t really celebrated. It was primarily because nothing was ever good enough. If it wasn’t perfect, and as a child, your stuff isn’t perfect in any way shape or form, it’s hardly perfect in any way, shape or form. As we get older, but my father was brought up that way, so he was bringing us up that way. He taught us to have a very critical eye about the things that we do, and so we’re always looking at trying to do things. Better, which is good in the sense that my siblings and I are all highly motivated and really push ourselves to do the best we can. And then I go into my high school. We had majors, so I was a writing major, so I was doing critiquing and getting feedback and being told how I could do better there. And then I go into college getting an arts degree, which of course is critiquing there. And then my masters and writing, getting critiquing, there a lot of critiquing, which we mentioned in episode 13 on critiquing. And if you haven’t listened to that because you don’t think that’s very interesting. I’m telling you, go listen to it. It is super interesting and actually a really super fun episode, but I had so much critiquing in my life that I have this mindset about I can always make things better, and if I have the time and resource to do so, I try to do it. But I don’t think that’s always good. Thing I also have a personal battle which some of you have been listening to me or reading my publications for a long time may have heard some of this, but I have brain damage from an illness I had and like from 2007 to 2009. In those years I was very sick with something. That was eventually identified as environmental toxin poisoning, and I got better. We figured out what it was. I cleared chemicals out of my life. I’m much better than. It used to be, but I still deal. With memory and name and word recall issues. So that’s another reason why I scripted. The podcast because I was. Afraid I wouldn’t remember the words. That I needed to say. And if I haven’t had a lot of sleep, if there’s a lot of stress, you know, if a lot of stuff is going on, it can get even worse. So I think the brain damage issue is something that has driven me. To try to make things as good as possible because one it proves to me that I’m doing OK, that the brain is damaged, the brain damage isn’t affecting me unless I’m talking. And that also. That I won’t be judged for my limitations, so I’m always striving to do really, really well because I know I have limitations. 

So all of These things, my upbringing and my personal health issues drive me, but also, and we all have this, we are handicapped as a society when it comes to. Putting perfection aside, because there has been a historical preference or expectation of perfection in art that goes back to. The ancient Greeks. So that far back in all the years since, and all the various societies since have built on that idea, that if we can be perfect, we can be close to God, we can be the pinnacle of what humans can be. And I think that has been a detriment for many of. Us to have that. Woven into the core of our society, especially when it. Comes to art. So you’ll each have your own personal struggles. Will each have your own reasons why you might succumb to perfectionism and it getting in your way. Take some time to kind of explore where that might be coming from, cause it really does help and give you power to know where it’s come. Come from and if you find yourself doing any of these things like critical self talk where you’re telling yourself you’re not good enough or you’re stupid, or you’re such an idiot. Or why did you? Do that if you’re seeing those kinds of things to you, there’s probably a perfectionism issue in there if you don’t allow yourself mistakes or imperfections or any little mistake you make. Has to be eliminated, taken care of, or you’re not going to sell or show that work. If you find the time you spend on the work trying to perfect it. Sucks the joy. Out of the work. Definitely an issue because you should, if nothing else, be getting joy out of your work. And if the perfectionism takes it away, then that kind of primary impetus for working on your art is taken away, and then if you don’t finish projects or you don’t start projects, those are also signs that you may have issues with a fear that you can’t be perfect. So you can think about those things and imagine what might be part of your personal relationship with perfectionism. That may not be the best relationship for you. Let’s stick a bit more into the problems with perfectionism, so you understand why this can really get in your way. So I mentioned a sign of having a problem with perfectionism is that we don’t finish what we do all the time. Now I want to make note that unfinished work is part of an artistic process. It really is because there’s exploration and there is making things and realizing you you’re not going the right direction. And why waste time finishing something when it’s not what you need it to be. Restart, go another direction. So not finishing projects is natural and a normal part of the artistic process, so don’t think. Oh, I didn’t finish things, I. Don’t finish half of what I do, therefore I. Have a problem with perfectionism or. What not? It could just be a natural part of your process and that’s something you’ll have to explore and discover for. However, it could be a problem if you just won’t start. Pieces for fear of not being perfect. And that’s a pretty significant problem, because if nothing else, we should be working right. The other thing and my biggest problem with perfectionism is that it wastes time. We spend so much time trying to make things perfect when other people probably won’t. That or we go back and start things over and over again before we’ve done a full exploration of the piece that we’re trying to do in the first place. I learned this very dramatically in writing because working on a novel, I kept going back to the first chapter and rewriting it because I would. Change things down the line. But The thing is, if I keep rewriting that chapter and something changes down the line, I have to go back and do it again. That’s just silly. So you kind of. Should explore the entirety of the piece that you’re working on, or outlining the series that you’re wanting to work on before you start reworking things that may change because of things you’re gonna later. And don’t forget about overworking things, which can also be a huge time waster as well as something that could end up being destructive for your piece. So be careful of that as well. Another problem with perfectionism is self-image issues. When we’re not doing things perfectly, we think that we are not perfect, which we’re not and that’s perfectly fine. But we also tend to put ourselves down. Think less of ourselves, really. It can diminish our self worth and our self-confidence. Also, bowing to perfectionism means you may not be showing or selling your work or doing some of the. Things that are. Part of your career goals as an artist. Your artistic path may be blocked by feeling like you can’t sell or show or share your art in the way that you want to, because it’s not perfect. And I think one of the main things for all of us is that if perfection is a problem, it’s often going to suck some amount of joy. From the work. If not all the joy from the work because you’re just trying to. Make it perfect. And sometimes, if we can attain some level of perfection that does give us some joy. But you’re going to have to measure how much joy you’re getting from the finished piece. Being as perfect as possible. Versus how much joy is lost in the process of trying to achieve? OK, now why do you do this? To ourselves. We could all these reasons why perfection is a problem, and yet I guarantee. You I will. And a lot of you will continue to try to make things perfect. So like I said, the reasons this happened is because one, we’re battling a historical expectation in our society. So it’s not you, it’s not something that’s just inherent in you. It’s our Western culture, particularly Western culture, that other cultures, as I’ll talk about, actually embrace imperfection and whether or not in our modern society that’s prevalent in those cultures. Still, I’m not sure. Or, but just realize that there is an outward pressure for perfection that doesn’t have anything to do with you and your strength or weaknesses to resist it. It’s just something that we’re gonna have to deal with and probably something gonna have to constantly work. On throughout. Our lives, right? Similarly, we live in a world and society where competition is really prevalent and. That pushes us to try to be perfect. Because we see people out there doing things that we think are perfect, that look perfect to us and we want to be as accomplished as them. 

And then on top. Of that, we’re being sold. All these things are like you can be perfect. You can be a master. You can just sell out of these shows by taking this class or doing this kind of stuff on social media. And we’re being told this all the time, which means we’re constantly looking at making. Ourselves better, which is. Fine, but we have to limit. How far we push that? There’s also the issue that we, as artists, envision what our work could be, but we don’t always think about what it just needs to be. It doesn’t need to be like a particular artist that you see online doing similar work. It needs to be you. It needs to have your message and it needs to have your intention coming through and we’ll talk about that a little bit more. But it’s also in a related subject the fact that most of us as artists, man, we have good taste, you know, we know what good art is, we know what good design is. We can see it. We may not always be. Able to verbalize it. We may not always be able to translate it into our work on demand, but we have good taste. We know what things could be because we know what good are. We also compare our work to others all the time, and I think in this day and age when we’re inundated with stuff, we see stuff so much more often than we used to that it’s very hard to get past comparing ourselves to other cause. We see all this stuff all the time and we see how popular they are and we see how many likes they have and things like that and we think. God, we want to be that

If you have the ability in your business model in your career model, in your, in your world to not look at other artwork for long periods of time, especially when you’re really delving into your stuff really deeply, I think it would be really beneficial because you need not to be comparing yourself to other people’s work as often. Yes, we need to feed our muse. Yes, we need. To feel that well. And being inspired by other people’s work. Is one of the ways that we do that. But I think you do that. You let that stuff just state or marinade or whatever terminology you want to use, and the important stuff will come out when it needs to. But if you do it all the time every day, day in and day out, I think there may be an issue for many of us that we can’t stop comparing ourselves because we’re seeing so much of the success of other people. And as that saying goes, we tend to covet. The things that we see every day, I think also there’s a problem that we believe there is a point at which work is finished and that finish point is nothing. Short of perf. We don’t often just say this is good enough, realizing that saying we’re done before it’s as perfect as it can be is not admitting defeat. It’s not saying I’m lazy or I’m not good enough. You’re just allowing your humanity to come through the work. I want to make. Note that this is not to say that quality. Doesn’t matter in your work because it does good solid construction of wearable or functional art. In particular shouldn’t be compromised. I think it’s unfair to the buyer or the owner. Of the work. If it’s not creative with the best quality materials and. For it’s also not good for your reputation if you don’t make quality work. If you don’t use quality materials and using quality materials really shows, so you buy the best materials you can with the budget that you have, because the better your materials are like paints, colored pencils, dyes, there’s a pigment level in those that will show and how the work comes out, the quality of some of your equipment like quality of cameras. Photographers, it really can make a huge difference in what you’re able to produce, so keep those things in mind that when we’re talking about backing off from trying to be perfect, I don’t mean backing off making. Quality work. I think we can also have a hard time setting aside this idea of perfectionism because of the judgment we fear from others. We end up focusing on that rather than on the intention, the message and the joy of the process. So thinking about other people and what they’re going to think, if there’s any way of getting past that, you may find it easier to. Set aside the idea of perfection in your work. So let’s talk about that. How do you set aside perfection if it is getting in your way? If it is detrimental to what? You’re doing. First of all, I think we need to set boundaries on what is perfection for us and. What level should we reach? So let’s start with the idea that, number one, you need to recognize that you are not your art. It is hard. To I know separate our identity from our artwork and yes, people will look at artwork and think about the person who’s behind it. But that doesn’t mean that you’re being judged. Think about. It your artwork leaves. You and goes out into the world. In some form you sell it, you give it away. It it’s, it’s on a shelf in your house and people see it there. It’s separate from you. Once it’s done, so the judgment on it should be separate from you, and you should take it separately. You know, don’t think if my art works not perfect. I’m not perfect and that’s a detriment to who I am and my identity and it’s not. Also, stop comparing yourself to others like I said. All of us. Are so incredibly different. There are so many different aspects to who we are as people and as artists that comparing us is really unfair because we all have different backgrounds, whether it’s education or the way we’re. Being brought up. We also have differences in terms of the length of time that we’ve been doing the work, especially in the amount of. Hours that are dedicated, like when I started in polymer Clay, I was doing big shows nine months later. The only reason I was doing that versus someone who’s been working on it five years or 10 years and hasn’t really done the big shows yet. I literally spent every waking hours from the time I decided I was going to be a polymer clay artist until I. Got my first. Big show, literally every waking hour. It was nuts. I was so obsessed. But that makes a huge difference that I. Who is dedicating all the time? Most people don’t have that time, so you can’t compare my timeline. She’s someone else’s time. Time we also have all. A different propensity for certain things, or a talent for certain things. So some people. Will take to certain materials or forms of. Art so quickly because. It’s just kind of how their mind works and other people will really. Work at it. We also have. Varying amounts of mental and physical energy. Due to our obligation. Like a father. With two small children at home and a full time job is not going to be able to put as much time and effort and energy into the work as the guy that just graduated college. As in a studio and some big, very culturally advantageous city. That is just surrounded by. That energy, they’re just such two completely different. Worlds, we also don’t all have the same budget for materials and tools like I talked about, so that can’t be compared either. And then there’s something that I don’t think is very often thought of or talk about. But some people have a lot of help and some people don’t. Some people have people that will do all the business, you know, trying to sell and get your shows and then others have nobody and they have to do it all. And that does spread you out a bit thin. All of those things differentiate us from other people, so there is no apples to apples. Don’t compare yourself to other. And then, remember, perfection is relative. It’s not an absolute thing. And really perfection is only relevant to your artwork when that’s what you need to be talking about when that fulfills some part of your intention that everything is perfectly created with highest level skill and without flaws. In other words, unless perfection. Is the intention of your message? Then it doesn’t need to be. An important part of your. Also recognize if judgment or rejection hinders you. If you think something is imperfect and is not good enough, ask yourself, is anyone gonna notice besides you, that that’s imperfect? Is someone going to like your painting? Less because you didn’t get that. Green of the grass color mixed quite right. So just ask yourself whether anyone else is going to notice. And try to step back away from that fear that should be judged or rejected because it’s not absolutely perfect as chances are people are not gonna see what. You’re gonna see we. Also, I know want more and want better like I was mentioning at the beginning. But start to look at what it’s taking away from you and get mad if perfection is taking you away from the things that are most important in your life. For instance, time with your family, getting other work done, enjoying the process. If it’s taking that away from you, you need to start setting goals about how much time each piece gets or. How much time you get to do certain aspects of the work? Like for instance, if you do jewelry art, there’s usually a lot of finishing and polishing and you could do that. Kind of forever. Things can always be shiny or whatnot. Does it really need to be that shiny? Maybe it is part of your statement and it needs. To be that way. But really like budget, how much time and effort you put into certain things and write down goals or outlines about how much you can do. Also have a guideline about. When work is. You know, like I mentioned that one of the reasons that we have a hard time with perfectionism. That’s because we never see the work is finished. And mind you, in our the work is never ever going to be finished. There’s always something else that you can do, but you need to pull back from that and have a set idea about when things are done. So for instance, the things. That are important. Or that your main intention is accomplished that you’ve said or shown what you aimed for. That the piece is serviceable as is that it can be worn or hung or displayed or used as intended. I think you also can set guidelines by starting to ask other people if they think the work is done when you think it’s approaching done, you can ask somebody if it looks done. Some parts of it don’t look done and get some feedback there, so you get a more objective view of when something is done. Also, another way to get a little. Bit more objective. Is to set the work aside when you’re mostly done or you’re thinking it might be done and work on something else for a while. So you kind of forget about all those niggling little things that you’re thinking might need to be fixed and then you go back to it later and ask yourself, is the intention there, is it serviceable and is there anything else that’s really problematic? That I might need to fix and you’ll see it in a different light than you would have in the time that you were working with it so closely for so. And also think in terms of deadlines. So you can say something is done when it hits this deadline. You know, like when you’re a working artist, you’re working for other people and you have a deadline. I was a freelancer, mostly in writing, but I did graphic art as well. You only had so much time to do the work and when the deadline hit it was done and you turned it in and that was as done as it was going to be. So if you give yourself similar. Headlines, then, that could also help you kind of limit how much time you spend on all those niggling little. If you do. Set deadlines as an independent artist. That can be a little hard because there’s no one there to. Be accountable to. So find someone that you can be accountable to, maybe your partner or an artist group or your audience. If you have a social media following of any sort, just put it out there in the world and you will feel like you need to stick to it because you said it right now. If getting rid of perfection at first is really kind of. Hard to kick. I’ve been working on this for like a month and a half now and it is so hard to set aside, but I’ve made a deal with myself when I’m initially forming or designing the work I’m doing, whether it’s writing the podcasts, working out the designs for these mosaics, we want. I do. Perfectionism is not allowed in the room. So initially I’m just gonna get lost in the process. That’s what I’m aiming for, and it doesn’t matter you if you’re designing or you’re forming the work. Initially, all of that is drafts and they can always be tossed, so do not let perfectionism in. If you find yourself kind of nitpicking at stuff you want to stop. Tell yourself it doesn’t matter. Scratch it out. Literally throw it away. Whatever you need to do to get perfection. As a matter of the room. And just let. Yourself, be sloppy while you’re doing these kind of like draft phases of your work. Be sloppy explore, get used to being imperfect in those moments. And then also another way to get past perfection. This might sound a little weird because I mentioned critique being a problem. Critique your work in a loving and kind way, and again episode 13, that’s what. It was all about just. Take the time to stand back and assess what works in your piece. Tell yourself what you love. Make note of the things that. You’re proud of. And write them down. Writing them down makes them more concrete. You will hold on to those feelings of pride and accomplishments when the written down in black and white. We’re doubling our brain does, but writing things down makes a huge difference versus just rolling them around. In your head, and then after you’ve done that, you’ve established what you love about it. Find areas of possible improvement, and then write those down as well and ask after you’ve made that list. Doesn’t matter. Go line by line. Does this thing matter? Does that thing matter? We’re leaving these imperfections in. Still allow your intention to be seen and heard. Will your intention be fulfilled? Even if they still exist, and if those perfections won’t make a difference where it. Counts class those things out, they won’t matter. Also, that action of crossing out something that’s written down helps your mind kind of set that thing aside instead of you worrying about it. And then if you do identify some things that you think, well, this really doesn’t get my message across, it doesn’t fulfill my intention or it doesn’t make it serviceable as a piece as is make note of those items and you fix just those items and you keep focus on fixing those particular items until the intention is met until it’s serviceable or whatever it needs to be done. So that’s the kind of critique I’m talking about, not. A critical you’re not good enough kind of critique. And then here’s an interesting one, this one I’ve been working on a lot recently develop a relationship with your inner critic. You always have that inner voice going. Ohh, you know that sucks or what the hell are you doing or whatever that inner critic may have? But you gotta tell them. You know what? I don’t agree. You gotta tell them that doesn’t matter or. It’s really not a helpful comment. You know, it’s not just you talking to yourself, you. Can talk back to that. In your critic, you can think of that. Inner critic as. This is what I do think of them. As that kind of. Contrary person, which you kind of like to contradict. So I kind of see my critic as that know what all person trying to tell me how things are. And I’m like, no, this actually has promise. Or maybe it’s not everything I hope for, but I learned a lot. Doing this it was great. So I’m trying to have those kinds of conversations with my inner critic. You can also see your inner critic if you don’t like that kind of contrary thing, you can see your inner critic as a teacher, someone who’s trying to help. But they need to be a teacher that knows. When to be quiet? So if you have a teacher kind of in a critic who’s telling you, oh, this should be better, this should be better. You can say. OK, great. I will take. What you told me, I’ll think about. It you can go. Sit in your desk over there and I’ll keep working. Just develop some kind of relationship with your inner critic that makes sense and that’s healthy and supportive and not sucking the joy out of what you’re doing. And then here’s the fun part, and I mentioned I was. Going to talk. About other societies that embrace imperfection, I found it really helps to be investigating these kinds of disciplines. That embrace imperfection. And it was super interesting and just kind of made me look at perfections and imperfections and maybe look at imperfections. In a different way. So in Japan, imperfection is not just embraced there. It’s often seen or talked about as a necessary. Part of art. They call this aesthetic Wabi Sabi. It’s a viewpoint that’s recognized historically from about 16th century Wabi Sabi is the deliberate. Inclusion of asymmetry and roughness in simplicity and a kind of organic approach to the design of all kinds of craft and artwork. So they purposely design things to be off center or they’ll leave a nick or a Ding in the pot. Three, as I understand it, this approach is rooted in an appreciation of nature and of natural objects, and the fact that natural objects where there’s a tree or a rock or a hill or whatnot, has a purpose and fulfills its purpose. But it’s not always perfect in appearance, so it’s kind of a nod to Mother Nature, if you will, and that she has the greater wish. Them she’s showing us that you don’t have to be perfect and you can still have just so much beauty and imperfection at the same time. There’s also some wonderful practices and we’ll start with the ones in Japan where they celebrate imperfection with repairing broken things. So for instance, kintsugi, which means golden joinery, is the Japanese art of putting broken pottery pieces back together with precious metals, usually gold, but could also be silver or platinum. And these joined parts have these lines. That show the cracks. The contrast of the precious metals actually emphasis. This is them. But there’s such a beauty in adding this precious metal. So the precious metal is used as a way to celebrate the imperfections and to realize the value is of the whole peace, imperfections and all. I’ll post some works of kintsugi on the Instagram and Facebook pages for you. There’s also a value of repairing. Shown in clothing and in Japan, it’s called Boro. It came about because prior to like modern times, clothes were often repeatedly repaired with scrap textiles, especially by those of low income. Until these pieces often became a whole different piece of clothing. And it’s not just in Japan that. This is done. I actually saw something similar in Europe. There was this dress in the Musee de la mode in Paris that was essentially all patchwork of different years that completely obliterated the original dress. And it was so cool there. Was so much going on with all these different patches and all these different patterns in there. And of course, patching is done worldwide on clothes, even in new clothing. Nowadays we have come to appreciate the value of the patchwork that it gives it, uniqueness that it gives it interest, this embracing of imperfection can be found in a lot of different cultures, but it’s often embedded in this idea that trying to be perfect is like. Trying to be like God. My introduction to this idea came in an art history class in college where we learned about the Navajo practice of leaving and intentional imperfection in every piece of craft. Because yes, they believe humans had no right to be like gods and achieve a God like perfection. So these imperfections were included both to recognize. Our humanity and our imperfection as human being. And also they would do things like you’d see a line in a Navajo rug that’s unlike the other lines. It’s looks like a mistake and it goes from the inside to the outside edge of the. Rug and the. Reason they did this is because they felt that the creator could have their spirit trapped in the piece if it didn’t have a way to get out and the way to get out. Through an imperfection cause that’s the way us as humans would be able to leave an otherwise perfect piece of artwork. So I thought that was really cool, that our spirit needs to escape and recognize its humanity and follow that path out. Such a great concept. The God is perfect and humans are not is one of the main principles in Islamic architecture as well. So even though you could go in and look at an Islamic building and look at these beautiful ceilings and they look perfectly symmetrical, most of them will have small irregularities. Now they’re hard to spot, and they did that on purpose, cause they didn’t want the irregularities to take away from the beauty. But they wanted to. Recognize that they are not God and they are not perfect, and so there’s irregularities purposely put into this architecture. Even the national Cathedral in Washington, DC has several architectural flaws, because medieval builders also believed that only God can be. Perfect. So you can be part of a very long and illustrious tradition of including imperfection in your work. 

So let’s kind of wrap. This up with the idea of exploring imperfection. In your work. You know, there’s all kinds of ways in all different materials that you can explore imperfection. So maybe step back and identify the things that you overwork, the things that you spend too much time on and do a piece that includes leaving that 100% alone. Whatever it is, if it’s polishing, don’t. Polish at all. If it’s mixing colors, mix intuitively. Anything that gets you to exercise moments of imperfection. There’s a lot. Of aesthetics these days, especially that are very open to that like grunge, things that show decay or corrosion as a style is wonderful for exploration. Of imperfection you can also do things like. Make something, then smash it or delete it if it’s a digital thing, or destroy your work in some fashion. The thing about that is it takes away something. That I like. To refer to as preciousness like we think. Once we’ve made something that has such a value that we can’t destroy it, so many of us have, like drawers or boxes of works that we haven’t finished or that we. I don’t think it’s perfect or that we. Don’t like but. We won’t throw it away. I say start throwing some stuff away. It’s not the work I think that has the most value. I think it’s the process. I think it’s our experience as artists that has the value. So if you can let go of seeing those objects that you make as having such a high value that you need them to be perfect, start reducing your idea about the value of the object and start focusing on the value of your experience. I think those kinds of things can really help you see the advantages of stepping away from perfectionism and maybe see the beauty in imperfection and just start that as an exploration for yourself next time you are. Go play around, get messy, do really imperfect things, practice imperfection and I think you can have a great time because it’s play, you know. I mean, kids don’t try to make things perfect, they just try to express themselves, try to be like a child. And I think you’ll find it more and more comfortable to accept imperfection in your work. Today was my testing of that. No script today, just a few bullet points trying to get these ideas across to you. I hope it succeeded. We’ll see when I sit down to. Edit honestly, but this. Is one of my steps in trying to get past my insistence on making things as perfect as possible. Hopefully you can do similar things in your own artwork and with your own journey and exploration. And if you want to tell me. About it, I. Would love to hear stories about your struggles. With or the. Ways you got past perfectionism. You can write me at the sagearts.com, go to the contact page and use the. E-mail form or you can leave a message on the leave me a message red button. Here I always welcome support in any form, whether it’s comments or monetary support. If you feel like I’ve helped you out here, consider giving back and you can do that. Through the donation buttons. There’s a PayPal and buy me a coffee button on the homepage of the sagearts.com. Also don’t forget to follow me on Instagram and Facebook. Those pages are the Sage Arts podcast. So at the sage. This podcast you can find me there and don’t miss out on future episodes. Go ahead and hit that follow button. If you are listening through a podcast play. You can also sign up for the once a week newsletter that just reminds you. What a new episode is about. Also gives you additional material if there’s something to be associated with that week’s episode, and that’s also on the homepage of the sagearts.com. It’s a little teal green button says news and notices. And if you want to leave a review, I haven’t gotten a lot of reviews yet, but I think it’s about time I asked you what you think. Of the podcast. So if you want to write me up a review on your podcast player, there’s usually an option to click through and just give me some information. Let me know what you think. I would love to hear it. And I’m sure other people who are exploring podcasts and see the podcast would like to know what you think as. That all said, go forth and be in. Perfect. Go forth and be human and enjoy your work and give yourself the consideration and the time to be human and be imperfect and find the truly important things in what you do as artists. So until next time, please do. Feed your news, go out and have new novel experiences. Be true to your weirdness, and we’ll see you here next time on the Stage Arts podcast.