GETTING THERE IS CLOSE TO PERFECT

People spend so much time looking for perfection that the time consumption soon exceeds the value of the perfection they might get to. We can free up some time towards looking for the perfect but this approach is on the watch of a ticking clock. The perfect idea can be found in an imperfect book. People have found elation in less than perfection. And sometimes perfection doesn’t get us there but tends to just put things off into a more perfect future, when I’m finally ready. Even if and when you find this perfection, will it echo into the future for you? So the fear remains, alright I surmounted perfections summit, but how long do I get to stay here? I’m finally ready but you everybody else and the day have gone away. I could have brewed an imperfect tea for you and me. I can’t have a perfect swim in the ocean if I don’t get there, to the shore or beach. I might wait my whole life for perfection when I could have done something as opposed to nothing. I can’t have the perfect run if I don’t begin to run. I couldn’t have had the perfect date if I didn’t get the date. So first and foremost we need to get there. That is the goal of the first order, el primer. I can fine tune when I get there. It’s like finding the radio station. First get to the station, and then adjust the tuning. The perfectionist standard might be applied, but the standard itself might be paradoxical. My perfectionist standard being applied beforehand may make the task seem more overwhelming, more monumental, more encompassing, and seemingly difficult and what happens then is that I end up bypassing the whole game. So by trying to be on the cutting edge, I’m off the edge, off the ship, out of the game. I ended up making the wrong call, in fact that all you can do is make the right or the better call. The idea of doing it right, by almost doing it perfectly, is not even the bar we should be trying to leap over in many cases. The real challenge is just getting there. That is the real perfection.

Say you wanted to hear a speaker on a given topic. This is your call. It is really a matter of getting there on time and actually hearing the speaker.

The perfectionist standard doesn’t even come into play really, you want to hear this speaker, and you will enjoy hearing this speaker. In this matter the point of perfection is just getting there. There is no other major concern other than this. It is almost a given that you will enjoy this speaker. So another one of the errors of the idea of doing it perfectly is that we are looking at things that already close to the category or idea of a given. It’s a given that if I get this, I’m going to super enjoy this. So it is just a matter of getting this, or getting there, rather than looking for the untapped opportunities to arise by applying myself towards trying to be more perfect.

It’s the greenest grass and I’m still looking for greener grass. I’m the King for life and I’m still running for office. It’s a given that you will enjoy this movie if you go to it. It’s a given you will enjoy the book if you read it. If you are enjoying a book on a page-by-page basis, it is almost a given that you will enjoy the remainder of the book, or it is at least more than likely. So the perfect thing to do is just read the rest of the book and do it without worries about doing it perfectly.

How about the perfect plan? When can you throw it to the wind? We can make plans of course and try to follow them. But try throwing a piece of paper or balloon into the rising wind. Try to predict its movements. We might be putting our plans into variables and conditions like that, our plans may be subject to forces affected by a multitude of changing factors and variables that might be as shifting as the wind itself can be. In fact a move into imperfection paradoxically can expand our choices, or at least increase our ability to peruse the choices, because it pays to keep light in shifting winds and one of the things that may keep me light is giving up the pursuit of perfection as I try out my ways. Good choices could still be in front of us if we stop stumbling over perfection, or getting stuck over what has formed into one idea of perfection or what can become a fixation, when there might be a million ideas of perfection.

The risk paradox and the quiz with this issue, is that the idea of perfection being a necessary presence may keep us out the area we are trying to get into in the first place. We look at whatever is present, whether it is perfect or not. The standard of perfection seems to have been applied until it actually became an imperative like a dominating theme but subsequently became extinct, extinguished, and because we just never go there and then never got there. If you never go there, how are you going to experience any findings that might have been there of perfection? You may not have seen a sunrise in months, some of which could have been magnificent but you never go there. We didn’t keep the fire going as to what we actually wanted to do.

The standard of perfection doesn’t have true application to all of the possible scenes and scenarios we could encounter. I have the perfect game, the perfect jump shot, but can I bring this with me in any useful fashion to the lounge chair on the cruise ship. The movie with only perfect scenes might be a short movie. The first standard should be a standard within boundaries that you can accept that will tend to get you there in the first place. If you have talent, things will take care of themselves. If you don’t have the talent to start with, and the call can be made on that basis, I’ll call it a day. And even if we are not that talented, that doesn’t mean we aren’t enjoying this to some degree. Can I play tennis without having to be the best in the world or having to actually strive towards this? But also if we have talent, we could look at this as something to which we could have some level or degree of participation in our talent. This relates to allowance, because I have some of this talent, I can allow for this talent to manifest for the reasons that pertain to using talents, whether I meet up with special or more perfect standards or not, a talent is a space I allow myself to occupy not on the basis of perfection but on the basis of using.

When we carry around images of the presence of perfection, we should first consider whether these images are useful. You tell your girlfriend I notice a slight imperfection. How useful is that? Those images of perfection can be useful to help us propel forward or toward, or help us in our considerations and contemplations of courses that we can charter. But if these images act as additional weights, further discouraging us from a given course, it might as well be discarded for all the good it does us. It might be better to send this to the scrape heap of ideas. Imperfect images can also inspire us. Perfection’s presence is a nice neat concept that just doesn’t come across on every board and every listing. Even the perfect situation might not present itself perfectly. No matter how perfect you are, if you are still on a rotating mass that is rotating around a star 90 million miles away, with subjective movements where atmospheric conditions will prevail regardless of what you do perfectly.

This is not to say that certain imagery or images that even arise spontaneously to you should not be carefully heeded as having meaning. In fact these images might be the first connection to what is possibly an unfolding reality.

You and me, we are always on the run. We are either running away or running from and towards. The run, indeed we have to make due on the run.

In fact people pay a lot of money just to be there, to be present at that game, that play, that movie or concert. Perfection can more relate to the immeasurable. But for many and often times perfection is more of a mathematical concept that does have application in engineering, construction and accumulation of revenue, working well often in theory but not always in practice. Of course it’s important that perfections standards are contemplated in building trucks, cars, bridges and so on. The manufacturing of a more perfect product will more often win the consumer and help the safety aspects of the product. But sometimes it seems we are putting the same standards to our personal maneuverings and personal appraisals of ourselves as we put to a machine. Say for example you find out that one of you was a robot competing for the same things. Maybe the robot has the better chance at the girl than you. You would say we weren’t on an equal playing field. We relate ourselves to robotic images or superman images that seem to go beyond. There is no Superman, it was only a show. We can’t get there.

But even for the smartest to advance towards a degree of perfection, first get there, and we will test for perfection afterwards. But the prototype needs to be there. First get to the North Pole and then set out the gauges to test the conditions.

Should we look for prototypes? I think we could at times we could look at someone who we admire and see if we have similar traits that can also become operative as sometimes those traits we admire are mirroring something similar that we may have. The prototype is representative of something you could actually get to. You could get there and it might be in the reachable range. For example, say we have admired a certain teacher and how she dialogues with the class. Maybe we have similar potential and could dialogue at a similar level. I doubt that teacher was ever actually perfect, but the prototypical model this teacher is presenting might be more useful towards giving a realistic example, rather than some perfectionist standard that doesn’t relate to any one person or situation that we already know or can find out about and is out of the orbit I can circle. You don’t look for the prototypical car among the prototypical giraffes. Compare within the proper and suitable range. If you don’t want to make any further attempts at perfection, you can adjust your prototype to look for the optimal. In fact, if this is really just about optimal, what am I waiting for? Thereby for any given course we might attempt, there may in fact be somewhat close examples that apply to us found within given individuals that we could observe. Not that we would copy them, but we could operate in a similar fashion. Likewise, I could do this. For a given game or sport, there might be an individual who has a similar style to us that can be an example for us, a prototype. As we contemplate our prototype, who doesn’t have to evidence perfection but seems to be more ideal, if it is another individual we can also try to see that although we admired this person in this setting, they probably have imperfections of their own that they needed to deal with themselves. We might put a halo effect on people because of perceptions that they are perfect by something as simple as outer appearance. Our understanding of perfection strongly weighs into the visual plane. How little we ever see however. But the prototype situation, person, or ideal that we are trying to emulate might be a more realistic approach in that we can accept less than a perfect scenario while first coming close to the prototype which can even get be exceeded without ever coming near perfection itself. The GM for the basketball team has an easier time finding the proto typical point guard, the Jason Kidd. I might be better off starting my search by looking for a proto typical women or something close to that model, rather than an outright perfect person while the proto typical or something close to it might seem less daunting and certain aspects can exceed the prototype whereas if I look for perfection there isn’t anything that exceeds that.

I might find someone is interested in me and I thought they were perfect. You might go down two steps in my eyes because you like me. I used to think so highly of you. Like George Burns said “ I would never want to be join a club that wanted me as a member."

Perfection of will is another concept. In fact I will more than likely have mixed motives and my own uncertainties as to what my willingness is predicated upon. If we are going to try and play the perfect game, then the question is, why do I want to play the game perfectly? Within the idea of perfection what should we include then if we are going to be honest about the perfection of the will. Is this idea the perfect thing to want? If I’m imperfect it might be the perfect thing to want something less than perfect because it might be a better fit in relation to my own imperfections. And then we can go back to the prototype. Other people may have these imperfect situations or imperfect things and may in fact have wanted them, so why do we feel so selfish or self-serving to seek these things, without having to be perfect about it. Are the lyrics of perfection there? Some point where we can tune in. What are the perfect missions, techniques, wishes, desires, interests?

Without copying, paint a picture somewhat like a Van Gogh and you’re in the good neighborhood for impressionist paintings.

Can I have two wishes, one for perfection, and one for imperfection? If I get both, can I deal with the duality present?

Looking back to the example of the speaker, yes, I did want to hear this speaker. A perfect wish you say. Well then, first and foremost, get there, hear the speaker, and you see if you get what you wanted. Your wish is fulfilled, the perfect wish with the perfect match for the wish. Two wishes are fulfilled, the speaker has her audience and you are glad to hear her. If the speaker gives a perfect speech and you don’t have an ear to her, what good is that?

Another reason to stop looking always for the highest heights of perfection is that there are other views you might like. And if you do like these views, or another view, not seen from the height of perfection, what more are you going to ask for. Like what you like, in whatever way it comes to you, whether perfectly or imperfectly.

Look at the point of disappointment. I am disappointed. I’ll never see this imperfect person again. I miss them and their less than perfect selves. You already like what you like. The point where you miss out is just not getting there. You may have missed a boat you really wished you hopped in retrospect with some good views of the coast, holding something you really did want to see first hand, which was less than perfect, which you still wanted to see. There may have been some points of perfection on a less than perfect trip. The perfectionist standard improperly applied can keep you from getting there in the first place. Then again I never had a perfect day, why look for it now. The point of acceptance is, I’m not getting the perfection I wanted and now I want to think about just what is acceptable for me in the hear and now.

The zone is what we are looking for. The hitter in baseball can get into a zone, in basketball the shooter gets into a zone where she is hitting most of her shots or darting easily around the court. Anything we can get into a zone on, like a runner who does find a zone , is about as close to the concept of perfect that we are going to get at this moment. Can we find elation within some imperfections? A zoned in conversation is near perfect. A date where the people find themselves in some sort of a zone is near perfect. All this relates to presence and we can see that there must be some relationship between presence and perfection. There is the near perfect sunrise present, but if I don’t look up and see it, I am not present to it and I’m not meeting up with the momentary perfection. But that doesn’t mean that sunrise wasn’t there. But that zone is never going to arrive if you first raise the bar of perfection so high, that you never did get there in the first place, although it might be among many reasons that you don’t get there, never finding that landing strip. You took off on a trip to perfection but you never landed there. The search for perfection might be one of the reasons that the striving becomes too much. You are searching against the fierce winds of perfection. Maybe sometimes search against the idea of less than perfect. The idea of perfection might for some become not an additional motivator but just another obstacle in the obstacle course of getting there first, another contributing reason not to. If it gets to that point, I can choose to walk away and my walk away means I am doing this because I am good enough to be somewhere else. Now I am talking about another platform, the platform of good enough and indeed I might be good enough for this. I might be good enough for that as I walk away from perfections demands into the sunrise of something new. Being good enough means not only that you can walk into, but that you could walk away as well because you will still find another way because you are good enough to do that.

So many things that were possible have been cancelled because the participants didn’t see wanted perfection. The search for perfection is more of a reason to let go rather than hold on to dreams. Your less than perfect motivations are still motivations. Get there and then see, what you see, hear what you hear, and let the situation itself speak to you. Worry about perfection later if she gives you an invitation to visit. Maybe there was some perfection in antiquity but your not going to get there. Maybe there will be times of perfection in the next millennium but your not going to get an invite.

In the hierarchy, the list of priorities, first get there, drop perfection down the list until you arrive. Anyway how low are you on the totem pole anyway? Just because you’re not perfect, doesn’t put you on the lowest rung of the ladder and be careful not to believe you are operating there, because that is as false a belief as your belief that you could be close to perfect. Even if you have some inabilities, it is unlikely you are on the low rung and you still may rate highly despite your miss on perfections.

If you want to get to the track and enjoy a day at the races, hold your bets, first get there with some money in your pocket. The horses will do what they will do, it will be a gamble, for you might win, you might lose, you might run, you might love, just get there. Don’t be disappointed that the horse named perfection isn’t running because you can still gamble on love.

Wins, the losses, the gambles, all the secondary to getting there, seeing that leaf before it finally falls, getting to Rome before it has vanished. At the end of the movie Gladiator, the fading leaves of the fall had fallen into the Coliseum, symbolizing that the end was near for some of the central characters. The movie seemed to say that from the raised dais of the splendors and glories of Rome as it was then and as the visible pantheon of perfection from that dais, only the eternal could follow.

It’s okay to have some bars, some perfectionist’s standards. But a bar becomes the bars that become the barriers that keep us out.

But we can also do away with the bar totally. Why leap over a bar when you can when you get rid of the bar outright? Why bring any standards whatsoever into this. Do I need to have some magic elixir, some sort of standard of success for this endeavor? Why bring this to the table when it may not apply. I can throw my standards overboard.

If I raise the banner of perfection, I should look at it as more of something I can view or look towards, or bring into my sights, as an encouragement. First, the banner of the perfect might be different for me and different for you. Even the idealized prototype is often different for each individual. Everybody has a bit of style that can be unique. The banner can be very much related to the individual and your banner might be different than mine, just like your prototype might be different than my prototype. A friend of mine looked up at the banners hanging in Madison Square Garden and just saw Bill Bradley’s in that moment. It did apply to him in a way he played that style of basketball and was also interested in politics as well. But I can see this banner as such, maybe above me, maybe somewhat in the distance, maybe something to strive for that has some relationship to me and my own interests but not necessarily attainable at this time. The banner comes into play only in that it relates to me in some way and has some level of obtain ability.

The idea of perfection itself can cause a lack of movement. If I can’t do this perfectly I might as well bag it. If I can’t skirt the coast perfectly I say why travel the coast? Because I believe I can only move within the lines of perfection, I limit my movements to those lines. But then finding out what those lines are and then keeping to them is a lot of work as well, that I might as well just unburden myself from unless there is enough evidence that it is worth the effort to do this. We might bail earlier if we don’t see perfection, but there still could have been views in the situation we would have liked and it might have been worth it to hang around, not to bail and to get some of the pictures that you will like regardless. The girl feels this guy doesn’t meet her standards and bails right away. Better safe then sorry. The lack of leeway towards allowing some imperfection to come into view causes a lack of movement to continue on this exploration. I’m contradicting my explorations by trying to be perfect about them. Was it really worth it for Columbus to try and be perfect about his first trip to America where he lacked a map of America because he didn’t know it existed?

The case is summarized before it is ever brought to court for discussion and argument. Even if I were looking for perfection only, I would still want the imperfection to come into view so I could sidestep it if I wanted to. Maybe the corollary goal to perfection needs to be movement, I want some movement on this issue. If the perfectionist standards gets me going then fine, but if it leaves me frozen in my tracks, far from an accord or pact, even in my attempts, then it is running counter to my previously stated interest, the perfection I seek works against me moving and I’m not moving simply because I’m sitting with perfection but the truth is I’m not sitting with perfection and therefore I’m simply wrong. Perfection is not sitting with me, or moving with me, so there is no reason not to move, because by sitting still I’m not getting perfection and by moving I’m not getting perfection so I don’t decide whether to move or sit on this based on perfection. The better model to work with in terms of my thinking is close to perfect. You can think of some things you have done close to perfectly, but it is more difficult to think of things you have done perfectly. But you can visualize times and places where you have been close to perfect maybe you can revisit that.

Think of the running back in football as he seeks the perfect run, he moves to the left or the right through this hole in the line, openings which depend on the continuing adjustments of defenders, quickly changing within the movements of the game. There are going to be unknown movements on the field within the confines of the game. It’s not like he is going to get a chance in most cases to run to the goal line, which represents perfection for him. There isn’t even a chance for the perfect run.

This is the way of prevailing winds, why pine for perfection when the very elements could be against us at times.

Why do I have to necessarily cast my lot with perfection, it can be a consideration, but a requirement is something I have to pursue and the have to can get in the way of the want to. Can I hedge my bets with a little consideration towards that which is less than perfect? Can a long shot be worth a bet? I can think about being perfect, but do I have to be. I can think about being the best, but do I have to be the best just because my thoughts alone brought me there.

Say I’m on a wagon train out West in the 1800’s, do I need to preserve perfection, plant the perfect garden, if I’m only going to continue on and uproot in a short time, to the next dig. Even if we can obtain perfection, can we preserve it anyway, or is the cost of maintaining perfection high too, the seemingly high maintenance of perfection. Keeping up with the Jones may be not what I want to do every day. Especially over time, perfection might quickly unravel and dissipate, whether we water the gardens or not.

There may be golden opportunities in less than ideal or perfect scene. I could meet my dream girl in front of a garbage dump. If I wait for the perfect opportunity I might miss out on the perfect I wanted which was found contained in the less the perfect opportunity. An imperfect investment could have netted me the perfect yield. People do this all the time, they wait for the perfect conditions to set sail, and they miss out. Just think of an investment opportunity, what is the perfect time to get in and that sometimes is only best known in retrospect. I could stumble upon perfection on some imperfect road. If the perfection I seek doesn’t float my boat down the coast, then maybe I should look for imperfection to get me going. At least I’ll catch some of the coastline; even if I do this imperfectly I wasn’t totally lost to what I wanted.

If we do get into the idea of perfection, then the idea of maintenance comes into play. How do I want to maintain perfection across the landscape that is crossing into planes of imperfection and outright chaos? The recent movie the Patriot contains a scene where the two armies meet on someone’s perfectly manicured lawn. It highlighted some of the absurdities of combat, a perfect landscape not against imperfection but against outright anarchy. The patriots fought in what was considered at first an imperfect fashion of ambushing from the woods.

With the new President, maybe he is growing with the job. If I’m aiming for perfection right away should there be room for growth, movements, and some leeway on the ride. I could make a mistake I hope it will not be glacial in proportion, all encompassing, covering over all the good. I expect to make some mistakes, but I hope I don’t hit an iceberg outright.

We hold so tightly to the idea of perfection, that the idea itself loses some utility, and ultimately we lack movement and ability to go left or right, this way or that way, and we lose some of the spontaneous answers that can be applied. The imperfections I can use are passed by for the perfections I couldn’t use. If my idea doesn’t hit on perfect, it still might work for me. Or might find I’m hitting the perfect wall, oh well.

A movie that was interesting was the Perfect Storm.

It highlighted the idea of movements in relation to perfectionist standards.

The fisherman had a draught in their catches and there were complaints that no money was coming in. They went out and had a great catch in the middle of the Atlantic , in a setting, which was incredibly calm and beautiful. However the ice machine, which would preserve the catch, broke and they needed to get back within a couple of days or the catch would go bad. There was news of a storm brewing of monumental proportions, and they debated the decision of letting the catch go bad and staying safely out to sea and away from the hurricane or trying to maneuver back through the storm. Some of the members said they could let the fish go bad and just try again another time. But the decision was made to go for it, and they did get perfection, the Perfect Storm. The movements under the goal of getting this great catch to market were made when probably the perfect thing to do was just enjoy the beautiful weather they were in, accept the loss of the catch, and try again another time. There prior idea of perfection couldn’t be reached and their movements under that proved to be a mistake as the film went on and even really a mistake right then and there. A final moment was a Titanic wave approaching a central character as he floated away. Just seeing the motion and size of the wave was enough to know that we were at an ending. Nothing less than an ocean liner could have been capable of handling such conditions and even that would have been doubtful. They didn’t size in proportion and there was a lack of attention to proportion in their attempts. The waves were ridiculously high. So when do we pull our poles out of the water and stop for the day, and let hopes for perfection go away.

The situation they were in had changing coordinates. The stations had changed. The sea changed it’s formation and design and perfection showed a different face. The perfect thing to do would have been to stay in the calm area of the Atlantic near Europe and let the fish go bad or bring the fish to a European market, which were still accessible through safe waters. They should have followed the new design of perfection or at least kept out front the idea of self-preservation in the ordering of priorities over changing coordinates.

The idea of this story and this movie which carries the word perfect in its title is that when striving for perfection, there still is the need to accept changing conditions, and keep an understanding of what is still accessible. They should have accepted that their ice machine did break, that the storm was a ridiculous hurdle to try to overcome and kept an understanding that the calm seas near Europe were still accessible as a haven from the storm and as a place to fish again at a later possible more favorable time.

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