My Practice of Imperfection

So what have I been doing for the last couple of weeks you ask? Wearing my beanie cap and then practicing the art of imperfection. As you know when you put a beanie on in the morning, you either have to commit to wearing it all day or you have to live with beanie head. How uncomfortable I have been all week. But my affirmation almost everyday this week has been- " I embrace my imperfection, with love, kindness and compassion." So I guess this is where I cop to I have been a perfectionist my whole life. Thank you mom and dad for that little gift, that instead of elevating my life, it stifles my creativity if not downright inhibits it full potential for growth and full recognition of my own power. Let me explain. I have a idea, and sometimes it's an amazing idea at least in my own mind and soul. But being the perfectionist I am, I won't even write it down, because, as I am thinking about this brilliant idea, I am already thinking, no one will like it, people like everyone will think it's stupid, including me now. So then I start to pick apart my idea, looking for all the flaws and I find all of them and then plus some that I am sure other people will think of. And then if I can even start to lay out the wonderful idea, I can never perfect the end product. So why would I even start something I know that I can't finish because it's a stupid idea to begin with. Even as I write this, I am thinking, if a friend was sitting across the table from me, telling me this, what would I tell them if they asked me I thought it was a stupid idea. Would I tell them yes it was stupid, or would I encourage them with love, kindness and compassion to follow their dream, their ideas. And yet I refuse time after time to take my own advice. I can practice kindness and compassion for people around me or so I think I am, but am I as compassionate and as kind to people as I can be? I only ask this question because I, time after time can still be so unkind to myself. Now I will say, I have gotten better with this self-compassion stuff, since I have gotten sober, some 11 years ago, and in this last year even more so at the cost of a somewhat incredibly painful learning curve. And as I sit here watching one of my favorite movies ever (The Matrix), the lead character asks Neo if he would go back if he could? I got to be honest and say, I have thought about this very question many nights as I lay in bed, crying, letting go of this idea of being perfect and wishing in one hand I could go back to that state of ignorant bliss, and then on the other hand, knowing full well, that I would never go back to where I came from. I am slowly waking up, in my meditation first, and then as I try, doing the best I can, to walk a mindful path. It is a conscious decision I make every morning in my meditation, to carry with me, a sense of being compassionate , kind and mindful through out my day. What I have also start to recognize, is that I can not, I repeat I cannot be authentic, when I am trying to be a perfectionist.
As I told a friend of mine the other day, being authentic, is not a practice that comes naturally to me, it is something I must practice each day. And the only way I can do that, is to continue my practice of self-compassion, self-love, self-kindness and most important self-forgiveness, for without those key components, how can I possibly love completely unconditionally or forgive anyone completely. So today I am doing the best I can can do, and I do with my beanie cap hair.