Perfectionism: Down the rabbit hole

A rabbit falling into a surreal hole filled with broken clocks, a visual metaphor for perfectionism’s time-draining spiral.

While editing Braveheart, Mel Gibson spent countless hours in the editing room, adding and disregarding frames and even entire sequences from his film. At some point, his chief editor said: "If we continue like this, we are not going to hit the distributor's deadline, and the outcome might differ significantly from what we originally pitched".

Does this situation sound familiar to you?

Of course, the film was a worldwide success, but it ended up having an unusual long runtime, and even with the naked eye there were obvious continuity mistakes.

Perfectionism is how we demonstrate how passionate and detailed-oriented we are. Right? However, it can be exhausting, time-consuming, stressful, frustrating, and counterproductive. And that is a problem.

If something moves forward harmonically, you are on the right path. If it doesn't, it might mean that we are stuck in the perfectionism hole.

“In the end, perfection is just a concept, an impossibility we use to torture ourselves and that contradicts nature.” - Guillermo del Toro.

How do we avoid falling for this naughty rabbit?

For starters, make a feasible, trackable plan.

Try to foresee the unexpected, and have a contingency strategy.

If a situation arises, communicate timely, concisely, and assertively.

Planning is like writing a blog entry: To begin with, you need a structure, and polish it until you feel it flows... like an orchestra executing a symphony. And the key here is that you have to dedicate time to do your planning.

Without a plan, you will find yourself changing your mind constantly. You will never feel entirely pleased. You will be going back and forth, extinguishing flares as they pop up, hopping erratically from one place to another. That is the root of inefficiency. And inefficiency is where perfectionism thrives because it deters and blockades the workflow.

Believe it or not, there is an extended version of Braveheart that has not seen the light of day yet.