A Short Reflection on Perfectionism
I haven't been very good about writing lately, privately or publicly. There is only one reason this bothers me, and it is that when I do not stop to write, time and moments speed by me like a blurry train, unexamined and unincorporated. I need to put pen to paper - to make my memories into meaning, and to find God moving in the chaos.
Thankfully God does not stop talking when I do not listen well. It just takes me longer to hear anything. Lately every time I get quiet I've been thinking about the boxes I put myself in - for routine and steadiness and reassurance - boxes that paradoxically sometimes bring freedom and enlightenment and sometimes shame and limitedness.
Like "I have to run 40 miles a week in the off season." And "I need 'x' amount of money in savings." And "I have to keep my 3.95 GPA." All of my arbitrary goals and shoulds that bring me so much joy when I fulfill them and so much guilt when I fail.
My husband often loves me out of my cages. In this way he is an agent of my sanctification. He brings sanity and joy to my irrational fears; he comes to find me when I'm lost in the deep wandering of a guilty anxious soul. I've made a promise not to stay lost in those moody fears, a promise I imperfectly keep, and so I am learning to cup my hand over my brow and watch for him coming. This is a form of the grace of God.
As for my boxes, I have found that some of them are also places of grace, and I want to say that running 40 miles a week is one of them. Doing hard things that are good, sticking to a goal and going through the peaks and valleys of it - that's the stuff of good stories. I always think to myself that any run over 5 miles is a story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end. You think and feel more than one thing in that arc. And how beautiful to reliably get to the end of a story arc and always find joy. That's why I run.
The hard part, of course, is when my goals go unfulfilled; when my boxes become cages locking me into a shame where my fears have real grip. I don't think it means have no goals, quotas, expectations, boxes. It just means I need to work harder on my response to failure.
I already know the way to joy is through endurance of pain. I know this from distance running for example, and the slog of higher education. But maybe also God's grace can break in and put joy in the cages where fear and failure rule. Just maybe I don't have to always succeed to feel that joy. And if grace can be found in the failure, too...well, then the gospel is truly good news after all.
Thankfully God does not stop talking when I do not listen well. It just takes me longer to hear anything. Lately every time I get quiet I've been thinking about the boxes I put myself in - for routine and steadiness and reassurance - boxes that paradoxically sometimes bring freedom and enlightenment and sometimes shame and limitedness.
Like "I have to run 40 miles a week in the off season." And "I need 'x' amount of money in savings." And "I have to keep my 3.95 GPA." All of my arbitrary goals and shoulds that bring me so much joy when I fulfill them and so much guilt when I fail.
My husband often loves me out of my cages. In this way he is an agent of my sanctification. He brings sanity and joy to my irrational fears; he comes to find me when I'm lost in the deep wandering of a guilty anxious soul. I've made a promise not to stay lost in those moody fears, a promise I imperfectly keep, and so I am learning to cup my hand over my brow and watch for him coming. This is a form of the grace of God.
As for my boxes, I have found that some of them are also places of grace, and I want to say that running 40 miles a week is one of them. Doing hard things that are good, sticking to a goal and going through the peaks and valleys of it - that's the stuff of good stories. I always think to myself that any run over 5 miles is a story, with a beginning, a middle, and an end. You think and feel more than one thing in that arc. And how beautiful to reliably get to the end of a story arc and always find joy. That's why I run.
The hard part, of course, is when my goals go unfulfilled; when my boxes become cages locking me into a shame where my fears have real grip. I don't think it means have no goals, quotas, expectations, boxes. It just means I need to work harder on my response to failure.
I already know the way to joy is through endurance of pain. I know this from distance running for example, and the slog of higher education. But maybe also God's grace can break in and put joy in the cages where fear and failure rule. Just maybe I don't have to always succeed to feel that joy. And if grace can be found in the failure, too...well, then the gospel is truly good news after all.
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