Perfection and the learning process.

My wife and I, have a disagreement, that comes up from time to time, about whether or not I am perfect. She asserts rather strongly that I am. While I know, in no uncertain terms that, I am not even close and never will be. But, my goal is to do the best I possibly can at whatever I set my mind to.

And in many cases, with many things, I do actually do a better job than most other people. Many of my successes can be attributed to failure and negative feedback. How can this be you wonder?

Well you see, negative feedback is more than just insults and name calling. Negative feedback is a tool that can be used for course correction, much like a ship captain sailing by the position of the stars. In its simplest form negative feedback would be something like, your goal is that way, or this way is not the right way.

Imagine for just a moment that all forms of negative feedback just vanished from the universe.It suddenly would be impossible to tell someone that they are not doing well, or that they are heading in the wrong direction. If this were to actually happen, people would still fail, but nobody would be able to express why. In fact, the rate of failure would skyrocket because nobody could correct their errors in any way other than random guesswork.

If you are always winning or succeeding you are never learning. The way that we learn is by making mistakes. When we make mistakes we find out what things do not work in getting us to our goal. At first, we make great big mistakes that are wrong in so many different ways. With negative feedback we can be told exactly how far off our last attempt was from success. We compare our failures with one another and see which ones were closer to our goal and which ones were further from it. We do more of the kinds of things that brought us closer to success.

Gradually we begin to move in the right direction and make less and less mistakes. By being told that we are doing the wrong thing and just how wrong it is, we learn to zero in on the right thing.

Whether the source of negative feedback is a mentor, the reading of a map, a walk-through(for a video game) or the image in our mind of what success will look like, it works the same every time. We compare where we are with where we want to be and use negative feedback to adjust our course.

Without negative feedback we could never learn anything new or get better at anything that we already know or do. Succeeding at anything would become completely random. With no way of improving people would stagnate. Life would become completely chaotic and uncertain with no hope of ever changing it.The earth would spin out of control and we would all explode.

Okay, so maybe that last part is a small exaggeration, but you get the idea.

Strive for perfection. Celebrate imperfection.

Have you achieved perfection?

There is a pattern of behavior that I have noticed among some of the people that I live with. And at first I wasn't sure how to deal with it, so I didn't say anything. I just let it drop.

Here is an example of what I am talking about. A discussion came up about our kitchen. It was mentioned that people have been leaving it in a very messy condition. Nobody wanted to admit that they left a mess but nobody really denied it either. I suggested that others could clean as they go, while cooking, so that when they were finished cooking the kitchen was clean and there was no mess to clean up afterwards.

This has been my personal method for a great number of years. My reasoning for this is because I know that after eating a good meal I don't want to get up and clean. And before I started doing things this way I left more than my fair share of messy kitchens.

The response I got was a general nodding of heads and agreement that it was a good idea. But one of the people who agreed that it was a good idea said "I'm not very good at cleaning as I go" and then meandered off to their room and closed the door, thus ending that part of the conversation. This was not the first time that had happened and was not the only person who has given that response to my suggestion.

So based on this example you can probably see that the pattern is yeah that's a good idea, but I suck at it and then nothing changes. Directly telling people to work on improving the things they are bad at does not work. Much personal experience with repeated failures tells me that this is so.

So what to do? While pondering the nature of change and how we make our choices it occurred to me that we are lucky in that we have the capacity for change. We are not fixed in one way of being with no room for improvement.

What if in response to the that's a good idea but I suck at that conversation, I started talking about machines? I could go on about how it's too bad that a machine, once manufactured, is done. No matter how good or how flawed, it can not change its functions. It can never be any better at what it does than it is at the moment of creation. And in fact over time will only get worse and worse.

But as people, we are truly lucky in that we have the ability to adapt. We can find the things that we like about ourselves and continue doing them. But the things that we do not like, we can change, through time and effort. We can improve as time goes on becoming steadily better and better until we are exactly who and what we want to be.

Then I could ask those around me if they believe that they have achieved perfection. Regardless of whether they say yes or no, the means for fixing the problem at hand becomes readily apparent.

If they say that they believe they are currently their ultimate self, the pinnacle of what they will ever achieve and if I am not satisfied with their opinion of perfection, then I know that I do not want this person to continue to be a part of my daily life.

If on the other hand they admit that their life could do with some changes we can discuss ways in which improvements could be made. I could ask how they prefer the kitchen to be when it is time for them to do their cooking. Most people when given an option choose a clean environment over a dirty one. It could be pointed out if they appreciate walking into a clean orderly kitchen it is only fair to leave it the same way for others and we can then discover what needs to be done to make that happen.

It can be pointed out that just because they have been bad at something in the past, does not mean that they need to continue being bad at it in the future.

That's a good idea but I suck at it, is a much better starting point than an ending point.

The road to empowerment

Self improvement, empowerment, enlightenment. They all mean more or less the same thing. It is the never ending journey of personal enrichment for mind body and soul. There is always more room for personal growth and improvement regardless of how far we have come. Just past the current obstacle is another breakthrough.

One may wonder, if perfection is unobtainable, if there is always more to do, why bother at all? I feel there are several good answers to this.

Which of the following sounds better to you? You can strive for perfection and perhaps get close but maybe fall a little short. Or you can shoot for mediocrity and probably make it. If you make it, go you, you succeeded at being average. But if you fail at mediocrity where does that leave you?

That's why they have a a saying "go big or go home" because nobody cares if you strive for and succeed at being mediocre. I'd much rather work my tail off striving for perfection (and fail) than coast my way through being average.

Also something most people seem to miss is that enlightenment is about the journey, the path itself, the road you take and all of the choices you make while upon it. Where you end up is far less important than each step of how you got there.

We have character development over time. As we have new experiences we learn more about both ourselves and the world around us. Our minds expand to encompass new ideas that we could not have conceived of at the start of our journey. You are not the same person that you were five years ago. And you will not be the same person five years from now that you are today.

There may come a time where you have achieved all the goals that you had previously set for yourself.  And if that does happen, you will set new goals and milestones for yourself. The reason for this is that what you believe is the perfect you and the perfect life for you changes as you accomplish more and more.

And last but not least, the only way to have any real control over your life is to stop coasting along and letting others make your decisions for you.Stop letting your parents run your life. Quit blaming other people for your problems.You get to stand up and take responsibility for your life and you get to be the one that makes sure it is on track so to speak, as well as deciding for yourself what on track looks like.

Why bother? Because the people that "bother" have a real a chance of succeeding, of having their lives work for them instead of against them. They are people that matter and make a difference in the world. Why bother? Because what kind of person would you be if you didn't?

Everyone has their place. But why be a sheep when you could be a wolf? Why let things just happen to you when you can be the kind of person that makes things happen?