The Imperfect Experiment

Image courtesy: lifepurposematters.com

I am careful not to confuse Excellence with Perfection. Excellence, I can reach for; Perfection is God’s business.  Michael J. Fox

Today, I begin my experiment.  It’s about taking a risk, taking a chance, not knowing all the possible permutations but having a go anyway without knowing about the outcome.

As a perfectionist, I need to know everything. But as a reforming perfectionist, I’m learning that I don’t really need to know “every thing”.  And the universe is helping me in my quest. You see even this post has started off as imperfect. I made many attempts at centring the image below, the text size changed and I couldn’t see how to fix it, and you know what, it didn’t matter. Despite my mind protesting, I just gave in and left it imperfect, because I realised that this imperfect post would not caused a major earthquake, or other similar calamity.  Funny thing is, when I gave in to imperfection, the faults magically corrected themselves!

As for the Imperfect Experiment, well, since my beloved rescue Greyhound passed away recently, I’ve been in a complete state of sadness and despair.  I couldn’t imagine getting another dog ever, because I felt she was the “perfect” dog.  My family adored her too, and they also miss her but also wanted to honour her by rescuing another Greyhound, which I know is a wonderful thing to do.  Problem is, there are so many dogs that need rescuing, that need homes but as always, I managed to narrow the choice down to 2. I just couldn’t choose the next  “perfect” dog. I flipped a coin, I used a pendulum, I meditated but I got nothing, no guidance, no inkling, just a big fat zero, and now I know why. I’m being guided to just choose.  Either dog will be perfect and imperfect at the same time.

So today, I thought, ok, let’s look at this as an experiment. Let’s just choose one, and go with it.  Let’s see what it feels like to just make a selection and be ok with that.  Even if the dog we’ve chosen turns out to be somewhat imperfect, perhaps it may dig up my garden, or hide all our socks, does it really matter?  No.  There is joy to be found in saving any animal.  There is joy to be found in having a playful dog, even if it does cause mischief.  There will be joy in knowing that I’ve made a decision, that will make a huge difference to at least one animal’s life. In fact, being able to be imperfect means I will help save another dog’s life. Surely that is the only kind of perfection worth striving for.

So this morning, I’m off to collect our new family member from her foster mum, and I look forward to seeing what alchemical process will take place as I try on a new idea about what it means to be perfectly imperfect.