perfecting the imperfect.....

I received a couple of emails in the last few days from friends, letting me ( gently!) know that my absence from the web has not gone unnoticed...to be sure, the last few months have been a bit difficult, but I realized this morning there is also something else going on in my head...I've been reading Brene Brown's book "The Gifts of Imperfection". I am about half way through, and to be honest ( someone gave it to me) I thought " I don't need this book...I am not a perfectionist!"...and I am not....but I am pretty darn hard on myself, which, from an emotional standpoint, brings me pretty much to the same place. Brene says in her book ""Perfectionism is a twenty-ton shield that we lug around thinking it will protect us when, in fact, it’s the thing that’s really preventing us from taking flight." basically, her message is that , to live your life in a wholehearted fashion, it begins with accepting yourself as WORTHY...regardless of your insecurities, fears, phobias, unfinished business...all of it. Accepting yourself as you are, and realizing your unique value, regardless, is the key ( I think...not done w/ the book yet) to much greater happiness and satisfaction. So...back to the point I was getting at... A good friend once said that "comparison is the death of creativity".... Well, here is where I am hugely imperfect. I don't want to BE anyone other than who I am. But I fret, and fear. About this. My blog. I hide at times, basically masking fear. That I am not enough. That I cannot take the glamorous photos some do. That I am not willing/able to spread my life as an open book so completely as some do. So then, I will never, ever have the community, and success that some in 'blogland' do...in my overly globalizing mind, I believe that all is lost, or impossible, and  I am never going to get good at this....or find my own unique groove...I become paralyzed. No, I am not straining for perfection, but I  realize I am still focused on perceived inadequacies, which is a habit that is equally deadly. Some days, I feel so stuck, I cannot even face my studio, my metals, my tools...and yet, that is what, above all else, gives me peace!  When I am sitting at my bench carving, the rhythm of my hands..... it's  a moving meditation for me. I push little bits of my heart and soul and my life lessons and everything I am into each stroke of the tool. And yet, I worry. Am I enough? Will it be enough? What is my place? Can I even carve a space for myself in cyberspace that is uniquely mine? And, here is the big one, equally viable. Compared to those I admire. Brene talks about staging a 'perfect protest'...creating sacred space for  a moratorium on perfectionism, if even for a short time. Short times, practiced diligently, can become good habits...this I know.... So, here I am, imperfect, but here. Because maybe the important thing is to keep showing up. Because each time, its simply an opportunity, no more, no less. And that sounds just perfect to me! Can you stage your own 'perfect protest'? What would be on your list?
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