Stop Trying to Make Things “perfect”
When I first started writing, it literally took me days to write such a short story of 300-500 words. I was posting something people could read and I wanted to make sure every word was flawless.
In truth, if I gave someone a copy of what I wrote in the first hour of writing the story and the finished product after a day of editing, they probably wouldn’t notice a huge difference. In fact, the 1 hour version was probably even better than the 8 hour version in many cases.
While there are certainly times when “perfect” is what you should be aiming for, this week’s Fast Company article highlighted the fact that it’s better to aim for “mostly accurate solutions,” also known as MFD.
The idea is pretty simple: Striving for constant improvement slows you down. By betting excellent instead, you lower your expectations and help yourself move forward and be more productive.
Again, this is not something you should apply to all aspects of your life, but if there is something that you constantly get hung up on or avoid doing because you are afraid of failure, striving for the good, not the ideal, can help you. motivate to get through it.
The idea here is simply to make a decision that will help you move forward. For those stories that took me all day, I should have looked at them and thought about what I thought they needed to achieve that “ideal” status. If there was no good answer, then it’s time to send it.
The same can be said for booking a flight, arranging a room, or just about any other task you can think of. If you can’t give a specific answer as to why something isn’t perfect right now, consider settling for near-perfect and moving on.
Penalty shooting can be a serious procrastination killer, make you more productive, and possibly relieve a little stress as well.