09/24/2026
What is perfection keeping you from starting?
Perfectionism has an interesting way of convincing us that we’re being responsible.
We’re just preparing a little more.
Thinking it through.
Waiting until we have enough time.
Learning everything we need to know.
Making sure that when we finally do it, we do it right.
But sometimes “I want to do this well” slowly becomes “I’m not willing to do this unless I know I can do it well.”
And those are two very different things.
Because almost anything worth becoming good at requires a season when you aren’t very good at it.
The first attempt may be awkward.
The first version may need to be changed.
You may make a decision with the best information you have and later realize you would do it differently.
You may have to let other people see you learning instead of only letting them see the finished product.
But maybe you’re like me, and “perfectionism” isn’t really your issue.
Comparison is.
I can look at something someone else is doing and think, “I could never do that the way they do it,” or “I wouldn’t be nearly as good at that.”
See, I don’t really care about things being perfect. Life is messy. People are messy. No one gets it right all the time.
But I do struggle with a different lie:
I’m not good enough at...
I’m not good enough for...
I’m not good enough to...
Fill in the blank.
Satan has used that one over and over again in my life.
But God has shown me something really cool over the last few years:
Sometimes your “not good enough” is exactly what someone else needed that day.
Maybe something you did made their entire week better.
Maybe the imperfect solution you offered solved a problem they had been struggling with for ages.
Maybe sharing something you’ve walked through gave someone hope for tomorrow.
Maybe watching you do the scary thing gave them the courage to try their own scary thing—even if theirs looks completely different from yours.
And maybe what you thought wasn’t “good enough” was never supposed to look like what someone else was doing in the first place.
That’s the danger of comparison. We can become so focused on whether we measure up to someone else that we miss what God might do through the person He actually made us to be.
So whether it’s perfectionism, comparison, feeling like you aren’t good enough, or something else that keeps you standing still, maybe progress looks a little different than we think.
Be the best of who you are today.
Keep learning. Keep growing. Do things well. But don’t shy away from the scary, unfinished, messy things simply because you can’t guarantee how they’ll turn out.
You don’t have to be someone else’s version of "perfect" or “good enough” before your life can have an impact.
Sometimes it’s right there, in the middle of the imperfect and the messy, that we find, and give away, the most life, hope, and joy.
So maybe the question isn’t, “Can I do this as well as someone else?”
Maybe it’s simply:
“What can I do with what God has given me today?”