The Perfectionist Trap

 

By Andrea Merrell

How foolish can you be? After starting your new lives

in the Spirit, why are you now trying

to become perfect by your own human effort?

Galatians 3:3 NLT

For so many years, I thought everything in my life had to be perfect—my hair, my clothes, my house, my car, my words—so people would love and accept me. That misguided thinking bled over into my relationship with the Lord. As a people pleaser, I also worked hard to please the Lord. If I didn’t do everything just right or measure up to my own self-imposed standards, how could He possibly love and accept me?

The truth is perfectionism is a trap that holds us back from receiving God’s unconditional love, acceptance, and approval, as well as those around us. We can never fully experience God’s peace or a sense of well-being as long as everything associated with us has to be flawless.

One writer says that perfectionism is a “mindset of self-defeating thoughts and behavior aimed at reaching unrealistic goals.” When we live this way, we set ourselves up to fail each day because we think our accomplishments are never good enough. When we fall short of our own expectations, it only drives us to try harder—or to stop trying at all.

The good news is that God knows us better than we know ourselves and accepts us just as we are—our faults, imperfections, and weaknesses—and He gives us the ability to love and accept ourselves. And according to Galatians, no matter how hard we strive to do and be better, it is the Spirit’s job to change us, not our own human efforts. The Message translation brings it home:

Let me put this question to you: How did your new life begin? Was it by working your heads off to please God? Or was it by responding to God’s Message to you? Are you going to continue this craziness? For only crazy people would think they could complete by their own efforts what was begun by God. If you weren’t smart enough or strong enough to begin it, how do you suppose you could perfect it? Did you go through this whole painful learning process for nothing? It is not yet a total loss, but it certainly will be if you keep this up!

Don’t let yourself get entangled in the perfectionist trap. Instead, strive for excellence: doing the best you can with what you have and what you know.

There is nothing—and no one—perfect except our Lord.

Photo courtesy of Microsoft 365.