letting yourself off the hook

My usual browsing about the web this morning yielded an interesting read by Dr. Lissa Rankin, The Pressure to Be Perfect.  It got me thinking about all the things I do less than perfectly: meal planning, working out, cleaning and tidying the house, walking the dogs, spending more time with my spouse... and the list goes on and on and on.

And now I'm wondering, why?  We eat relatively healthy meals most of the time, I do workout, the dogs are happy creatures and so is my better half (as am I) so what exactly is wrong with all that?!  When it comes to cleaning the house, I recently did what I thought was copping out - I hired someone to clean it for me and I LOVE it.  I did that because I felt I didn't do a good enough job at keeping the house clean, certainly not the way I would have liked to.  Now I'm seeing that hiring someone to do that actually relieves the pressure to be perfect at cleaning the house and gives me the gift of time to spend being better at something else, like walking our dogs or planning and preparing awesome meals!

So what to make of this pressure to be perfect?  I'm not sure, to be honest.  I do know that I hate the feeling of falling short but it it has got me thinking that striving for perfection is over-rated - WAY overrated.  After all, if you've achieved perfection, that would suggest there's nothing more to learn and that I don't buy for a single millisecond.  

More than anything, this has me reflecting on acceptance; acceptance for the way things are; acceptance that I have the ability to change or influence how things are (eg I can simply choose to walk the dogs more); and accepting that I am learning every day and therefore not perfect and never will be. 

So, here's to being imperfect, in all sorts of ways!