If you’ve ever felt stuck when starting a new project because you want it to be perfect, you’re not alone. This is a very common feeling and trust me, I have been there too. The best way to avoid this feeling and save time is by focusing on progress over perfection.
Focusing on progress over perfection will help you to become much more productive and reach your goals more quickly. If you start applying the techniques below, you will see a shift in your mindset regarding perfection!
This article is going to explain very practical ways to start focusing on progress over perfection.
How to Focus on Progress Over Perfection
To successfully start prioritizing progress over perfection, a mindset shift needs to happen. From a young age, many people are conditioned to believe that for something to be good or worthwhile, it needs to be perfect. This is instilled in many of us and challenging to let go of. Once you do let go, you will see incredible results.
Focusing on progress over perfection shouldn’t encourage you to produce subpar results. Instead, it should help you to reach great results more quickly. For example, if you have a task that needs to be completed with precision, sloppy work is not going to suffice, but the important thing to remember is that each step along the way (especially the first step) does not need to be perfect.
Why should you focus on progress over perfection?
Focusing on progress over perfection can be very challenging at first, but it will become effortless if you change your mindset. This mindset will help you reach your goals faster because you will avoid spending time trying to figure out the perfect way to start. Instead, you will immediately get going and make improvements along the way. By constantly making progress toward your goals (even imperfect progress), you will reach them faster.
In addition, you will feel more motivated and less likely to procrastinate. Oftentimes, people tend to procrastinate because they are striving for perfection. By striving for perfection, even the simplest tasks can seem almost impossible. If you instead focus on progress, you will be more motivated to get started. Removing the expectation of perfection, the first step will be far less intimidating.
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1. Set incredibly low expectations at the beginning to get started
You should plan to make a bad first draft. That might not sound like a good use of your time, but getting started is usually the hardest part. If you have low expectations for how you start, it will be easier to get started. Without spending too much time, always take a first pass even if it’s far from what you’d like the end result to be. This is the best way to start making progress toward accomplishing the end goal.
Whenever I find myself feeling stuck when trying to start a project, I remind myself that the first attempt doesn’t need to be perfect, or even close. Instead, I just need to give it my best shot and then I will know exactly where my shortcomings are and I can focus on those areas.
Setting low expectations seems counterproductive at first, but it can actually help you to accomplish more. Low expectations will take the pressure off and help you get started. Take a look at this article to learn more about the power of lowering your expectations.
2. Celebrate small wins
Celebrating small wins will help you to keep your progress going. Acknowledging success will boost your confidence to keep pushing forward to try to make progress.
It is also important to remember that you don’t need perfection in order to celebrate. If you have made a certain amount of progress, it is still very important to celebrate those milestones.
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3. Make small steps
When you’re faced with a challenge, break it into smaller pieces to make it feel less intimidating. After breaking it up into smaller steps, it will be easier to get started because it seems like a smaller task to complete. While it is important to keep the big picture in mind to give yourself direction, you should focus on just the next step.
After staying focused on each consecutive step, before you know it, you will have completed the original challenge. This is because each small step builds both consistency and momentum. This article explains more reasons why making small steps is a very efficient way to achieve a larger goal.
4. Don’t be scared of mistakes, accept mistakes and learn from them
Mistakes are a very common reason that people hesitate to start something. Making a mistake or even failing isn’t a great feeling, but you shouldn’t avoid making any progress because you’re scared of messing up. It is very common to make mistakes your first time around when doing anything. This applies to a workout, a new recipe, and so many other things. The first time you try something new in the gym or in the kitchen, it is unlikely that you will be able to do it perfectly. After trying this new thing more and more, eventually, you figure it out.
I’m sure you can agree that even if you had spent more time preparing and trying to research how to do it perfectly, you still would’ve made a mistake the first time around. This is where the mistakes are incredibly valuable. Maybe when making this recipe, you found that it took way too long to cut up the next ingredients when you already had something cooking on the stove. Next time you know to start cutting up those ingredients earlier so that you don’t run into the same problem.
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5. Once you’ve made some progress, start making improvements
This is an important step to ensuring that even if you’re focusing on progress over perfection, you’re still seeing quality results. For example, imagine you tried that recipe where you found that you took too long to cut up the next ingredients. Instead of doing something differently the next time, you try it the exact same way. In this case, you will continue to reach the same result. If instead, you make an improvement to how you approach the recipe, you will find that the outcome improves.
This is also true when writing a long report. It might be tough to even start getting words on the page, but after you use our first tip and get something down with low expectations, you can go back and touch up what you had originally written. I can almost guarantee that the revised version is better than the first draft after thinking about what to write for longer.
6. Stick to it even if you’ve made some mistakes
If you’re taking a first try at something and can tell that you’ve already made a mistake, it is important to stick it out. This is because you are still making progress.
For example, imagine you have the goal of going to the gym Monday, Wednesday, and Friday every week. If something came up and you missed the gym on Monday, it can be tempting to say, “well I already messed up for the week, I might as well skip Wednesday and Friday too”. In this situation, even if you are only able to make it to the gym for 2 of the 3 days you had planned, you will still be better off than if you didn’t go at all.
You should keep this in mind when you’re tempted to throw in the towel. Just take a step back and think about the bigger picture. This shows that it is important to continue making progress even after imperfect action. For more information on the importance of this idea, take a look at this article.
I hope these tips will help you understand how to reframe your mindset to focus on progress over perfection! Please email us at ourteam@wellroundedyou.com or comment below if you have any questions or comments. Thanks for reading!
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