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Perfectionism Quotes

Browse 300 quotes about Perfectionism.

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Perfectionism Quotes

“Another eight-week program modeled on Kabat-Zinn’s stress-reduction course. This version of mindfulness training puts more emphasis on sport-specific skills like concentration and embracing rather than avoiding pain, and addresses common athlete pitfalls like perfectionism by teaching self-compassion.”

PainMindfulnessStressEmbracePerfectionismSelf Compassion
Book:Endure By Alex Hutchinson & The Rise of Superman By Steven Kotler 2 Books Collection Set
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“In the past, my brain could only compute perfection or failure—nothing in between. So words like competent, acceptable, satisfactory, and good enough fell into the failure category. Even above average meant failure if I received an 88 out of 100 percent on an exam, I felt that I failed. The fact is most things in life are not absolutes and have components of both good and bad. I used to think in absolute terms a lot: all, every, or never. I would all of the food (that is, binge), and then I would restrict every meal and to never eat again. This type of thinking extended outside of the food arena as well: I had to get all of the answers right on a test; I had to be in every extracurricular activity […] The ‘if it’s not perfect, I quit’ approach to life is a treacherous way to live. […] I hadn’t established a baseline of competence: What gets the job done? What is good enough? Finding good enough takes trial and error. For those of us who are perfectionists, the error part of trial and error can stop us dead in our tracks. We would rather keep chasing perfection than risk possibly making a mistake. I was able to change my behavior only when the pain of perfectionism became greater than the pain of making an error. […] Today good enough means that I’m okay just the way I am. I play my position in the world. I catch the ball when it is thrown my way. I don’t always have to make the crowd go wild or get a standing ovation. It’s good enough to just catch the ball or even to do my best to catch it. Good enough means that I finally enjoy playing the game.”

FoodStressRecoveryGood EnoughPerfectionismEating Disorder
Book:Goodbye Ed, Hello Me: Recover from Your Eating Disorder and Fall in Love with Life
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“Seeking for perfection is like seeking for mental health without a definition of what it is. But if psychology and psychiatry are as lost as the people they consistently evaluate, and people are as imperfect as the imperfection they see in others, then I have to conclude that it is as wise to accept judgment as it is to judge first the ones who judge us. But it is also as wise as it is foolish to do so; for it is like seeking for a definition that can’t entirely define us. Because if one answer can explain a thousand questions, a billion questions would never amount to the importance of an answer, which the simpler it is, the more questions it answers. And in that sense, I must say, we are imperfectly perfect.”

PsychologyLonelinessDepressionPerfectionAngerMental HealthPsychiatryPerfectionismSelfesteem
Author:Robin Sacredfire
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“This isn't a journey of you becoming the perfect version of yourself; that's what cults are built on. This is the journey about receiving the gift of yourself - the beautiful, vulnerable you... that you're the kind of person who is relatable, touchable, and in solidarity with others on the journey of life.”

BeautyJourneyGiftVulnerableVulnerabilityConnectionPerfectionism
Book:Say Yes: Discover the Surprising Life Beyond the Death of a Dream
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“There is no way to genuinely, powerfully, truly love yourself while crafting a mask of perfection. I know, you know, we all know—it's hard to let your pimples and your flaws be seen. It's hard to stumble and bumble. It's hard to not know the right things to do or say. It's hard to not look like TV. Sometimes, it's really hard for me to be the awkward mess that I am when I'm authentic, instead of having runway authenticity—all natural, but flawless. But every time I allow that to be okay, not just around myself but around others—I affirm something to myself. I affirm, to myself more than anyone else, that I am lovable and acceptable unconditionally. I affirm that it's okay to take on and take in all the flavours and hues of human experience, and not just the ones that are acceptable in this culture, in this time, in this place. And that kind of acceptance, that kind of love—that's the kind of love that creates miracles. That's the kind of love I really need. That's the kind of love that makes approval taste like cardboard.”

LoveAcceptanceHumilitySelf LoveTrue LoveFlawsSelf AcceptanceApprovalPerfectionismApproval Seeking
Author:Vironika Tugaleva
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“Self-love is not the process of ignoring things, paying attention to fewer flaws or forcing yourself to look away from the parts of you that you perceive as ugly or unwanted. Self-love is the process of expanding your awareness, of seeing those flaws and imperfections alongside the incredible potential of the universe flowing within you, alongside the eternal truth of life flowing within your veins in each second, alongside the flickers of creativity and opportunity present within each moment of your existence. Like this, the imperfections persist, but only as lovable quirks, like a bad doorknob on the front door of a cottage in paradise, like a few thorns on a beautiful rose, like a cloud in a sunset. Like this, what was once unwanted becomes essential, memorable, humbling.”

BeautyAcceptanceSelf LoveFlawsSelf AcceptanceImperfectionPerfectionismSelf Compassion
Author:Vironika Tugaleva
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“Pregnancy had seemed a reasonable excuse for letting her metal-smithing tools languish, but that accounted for only eighteen months of the last twenty-six years. Motherhood wasn't the real problem, though it took him a long time to figure out what was. She needed resistance, the very quality that metal most demonstrably offered up. Suddenly Glynis had no difficulty to overcome, no hard artisan's life with galleries filching half the too-small price of a mokume brooch that had taken three weeks to forge. No, her husband made a good living, and if she slept late and dawdled the afternoon away reading Lustre, American Craft Magazine and Lapidary Journal, the phone bill would still get paid. For that matter, she needed need itself. She could overcome her anguish about embarking on an object that, once completed, might not meet her exacting standards only if she had no choice. In this sense, his helping had hurt her. By providing the financial cushion that should have facilitated making all the metal whathaveyou she liked, he had ruined her life. Wrapped in a slackening bow, ease was a poisonous present.”

NeedArtistsPerfectionism
Book:So Much for That
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“There is no greater suffering than constantly measuring yourself and coming up short, except perhaps the realization that your suffering is hurting others. But where do we learn these things? Because, really, they are learned. We don't come crying out of the womb because of our birth weight or because we have no money in this brand new world. We learn to measure and we learn to attach our self-worth to those measurements. These patterns we're stuck in aren't just painful for us, they're also distracting us. Every day, the gap between rich and poor grows while the people of developed societies do nothing, because we are too busy worrying about looking good. We're distracted, but not because we've chosen to be. Being distracted by our illusory inadequacy keeps us from changing the world. And believe me, we all have the power to change the world. If we only make the time. If we only free some head space. If you can't learn to love yourself for yourself (and how could you with such a paradoxical motivation?)... then do it for us. Do it for the world. We need you. We need your mind. We need your attention. We need your thoughts. Change your focus, and you will (not can, but will) change the world. You already matter. You just have to realize it for yourself.”

SufferingLeadershipLearningSelf EsteemSelf LoveSelf WorthSelf AcceptanceMeasurementChange The WorldPerfectionism
Author:Vironika Tugaleva
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“If we demand perfection from ourselves we are not living in the real world...The inherent problem in the relationship between the ideal & the real is that the ideal judges the real as unacceptable and brings down condemnation and wrath on the real. This sets up an adversarial relationship between the two and like all adversaries, they move further and further apart.”

Self EsteemReal WorldTrue SelfAdversariesPerfectionismSelf HatredSelf HatePerfectly ImperfectSelf Judgement
Book:Changes That Heal: How to Understand the Past to Ensure a Healthier Future
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“I remind myself, "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good." (Cribbed from Voltaire.) A twenty-minute walk that I do is better than the four-mile run that I don't do. The imperfect book that gets published is better than the perfect book that never leaves my computer. The dinner party of take-out Chinese food is better than the elegant dinner that I never host.”

ActionImperfectionPerfectionism
Book:Happier at Home: Kiss More, Jump More, Abandon a Project, Read Samuel Johnson, and My Other Experiments in the Practice of Everyday Life
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