You Don’t Have to Be Perfect, Just Be Better
Updated: Aug 12
Terri Lee Ryan has built a writing, media production, and speaker platform. As a lifestyle author, TV producer, career coach, and advocate, she brings underrepresented stories to a mainstream audience.
We are bombarded with self-help advice on YouTube, LinkedIn, and Facebook. Between the thought leaders, life coaches, digital ads, and AI programs, it seems we are constantly being told how to improve ourselves for perfection.
I have stopped reading most of the advice, as the more I read, the worse I felt about myself. I was on information overload, not knowing what I should be doing to find that perfect state of balance for perfection. It seemed to be a whole lot of work to not only follow the steps toward perfection, but also the ominous challenge of keeping myself in the “perfect” balanced zone.
So why try to be perfect if it is always out of your reach?
I started thinking that maybe trying to achieve perfection is the wrong way of approaching life, and perhaps we should just try to be better than we are today. To attempt to be an improved version of ourselves. This seems to me to be much more achievable.
Today I visited a friend’s church where he is the minister and an amazing speaker. Raised Catholic, I haven’t followed organized religion for many years, but my friend’s church is unconventional and inviting. I enjoy hearing him speak, and I always come out with a message to ponder.
Ironically, the message today was all about accepting yourself for where you are today, not a perfect version of you. You are still loved for who you are today by God. Striving to be a better version of yourself daily may be the best you can do. No one, even God, expects you to be perfect, as there is no perfection, just growth. Life is a journey of growth.
When I heard this, I thought about what I had learned in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) about living life, “one day at a time.” There is a whole lot of power in this phrase as it relieves the pressure of having to live up to this perfect image we expect from ourselves, which is not attainable. There is no perfection in life as we are all a work in progress. Coming from me, who had always felt I wasn’t “good enough” and set a high bar for myself, this is a breakthrough.
So how do we begin to just be better rather than perfect?
Not wanting to sound like all those other life coaches, AI, and thought leaders, I will keep it short.
Here are three tips for being better, not perfect:
Deal with your fear: confront a fear of yours you have been avoiding and deal with it. Fear creates negativity and depression. Yet once you have addressed the “big fear elephant” in your life, it loses its power over you and allows you to move on to a better mindset. We all know that horrible feeling of fear. It can be about anything. Again, the goal is to acknowledge your feeling around that fear and take steps to move through that fear of whatever it is that is causing you pain. Release your fear and get your freedom back over your feelings.
Take baby steps: When you become overwhelmed by issues that seem impossible to solve, it becomes paralyzing. It’s easier to avoid the issue because you don’t know where to start to make positive change. Again, it’s not being perfect, it is taking baby steps toward solving an issue. Manage a small piece of the issue and deal with it, and keep at it until the issue is behind you. Every time you make some progress, it’s a win.
Know when you have won: Often we become so obsessed with the process of winning, we fail to celebrate when we do have a win in our lives. We don’t take the time to celebrate just how far we have come toward being that better person, the one we are proud of and at peace with. Take a deep breath and give yourself a moment to celebrate your wins in life. It’s important.
When those thoughts of self-doubt wander into your mind, step back and know you are just fine as you are for today. You don’t need to be anything more than what you are at this moment. You are a perfect imperfect person like the rest of us, striving to be a better image of ourselves. When you finally realize this, you have already won.
Read more from Terri Lee Ryan
Terri Lee Ryan, Lifestyle Author, Speaker & Career Coach
As a lifestyle author, TV producer, career coach, and advocate, Terri has brought underrepresented stories to a mainstream audience. From her documentary, "I Married a Crossdresser", airing on Sky UK, to being a finalist for two of her projects at the New York TV Film Festival, she has championed women over 40 and the transgender community with humor, honesty, and heart. A popular writer, she has been a featured columnist and blogger for Chicago Tribune -ChicagoNow, Today's Chicago Woman magazine, The Huffington Post, Sister House, and Frock sites. She is the author of Life is One Big To-Do List: A Woman's Life After 40 and a thought leader on the transgender community with her podcast Shades of Gender.
