Recognizing the Truth About “Perfect”

I was coaching a client last week on a presentation he’s putting together. Part of the way through the presentation, he paused, and paused, and paused—lengthy. Unusually lengthy. When he started speaking again, a rather remarkable thing happened:

He went on with the presentation:

• No “uh,” “um,” “let’s see,” “okay,” “sorry”
  
• Simply great poise and presence—solid eye contact, strong volume and intonation, effective use of body language and visuals, etc.
  

And as a result, I went with him. I believed him, I trusted him. I knew he’d had an unusually long pause, and I didn’t know why, but it didn’t seem to bother him, so it didn’t bother me.

Whatever the reason for the pause—the mind goes blank, or lack of decisiveness about where to go next—most people look very flustered, and begin to falter and use the typical filler words listed above. In other words, most people are bothered by their blanking out, and they show it. And as a result, their credibility goes down in the eyes of others.

This client had done something really good—he handled the hiccup, the imperfection, with grace, and then went on to do everything else wonderfully. Interestingly, he didn’t recognize this. When he finished his presentation, he sat down and began berating himself. How he’d blown it. And I was able to honestly tell him that, while his long pause was unusual, it did not detract. Because he didn’t let it.

He’d wanted to be perfect. And I shared with him a secret about perfectionism. Since no one, NO ONE, is perfect, here’s the truth about “perfect”:

It’s not about being perfect. It’s about how you handle your imperfections.

And if you handle them with grace, you’ll win the day. He did. Your imperfections won’t stand in your way, and the way you handle them (with grace), and the way you handle all of the other marvelous things you do, will carry the day, and you along with it.

This week, for you perfectionists, forget perfect. Take a deep breath, handle your imperfections with grace (certainly minimize them to the extent you can, especially if they are an impingement on others, but don’t go crazy—there are other things for you to focus on), and get about the business of doing what you do best and doing lots of it and reaping the rewards as you do.