The enemy of the good isn’t just the perfect.
It is any attempt to avoid doing the work.
I spent much of the day learning about how block themes work in WordPress. It is amazing how many hours can fly by when you are learning and avidly working on a project.
Then, as I got close to a moment of triumph…it failed. Why? Because I’m sure I forgot to put a comma somewhere in the code.
I looked through it and compared it all with the one in the template, but couldn’t find it. So I cheated and simply copied from the tutorial. Unsurprisingly, it worked.
I love to tinker with my website. And this playing on a Saturday wasn’t spurred by the desire to change my site. I already had! It was to really get in there and do it myself.
So many options
That is part of the problem.
I’ve long thrown away the idea that I must find the perfect theme for my website.
And I’ve long been told to stop fiddling with the site because it is a distraction from writing.
But sometimes, the problem takes a different form.
That’s why avoidance shows up as perfectionism—because we never suspect that the person working his butt off to get it right is trying to avoid anything! But it’s a way of never having to be done. Because when it isn’t perfect, we can always keep working on it.
All of the good choices becomes a similar means of avoidance. Not because we aren’t discerning people; precisely because we are!
For me, the solution to any of these avoidance problems isn’t to avoid avoidance. It is to stop letting it have any power.
When there are so many choices, don’t run toward…
which is perfect (neither can be),
which is better (better is subjective),
or even what is the one that makes sense.
It is to stop thinking that something outside ourselves will make the choice between two good options for us in a permanent and ideal solution.
In other words, the solution is to reject permanence.
So the best solution among many options becomes far more simple.
Which looks good today?
And then future you can decide they might want to change things up a little.