Current Events > How the hell do you consistently overcome perfection

(+) Yeah! (+)

Or the strive for perfection.

Have a mini project due tonight for a class and I am already familiar with the software. I know the grading criteria is based exclusively on just putting a product together that meets some basic content requirements (i.e., must have two maps, three photographs and a simple writeup giving context for everything). In fact the maps and writeups are already done since it was part of last week's project it is just a matter of importing it into the system and making it look nice.

But I can't get over the fact that it's not going to be perfect, there's always going to be room for improvement and it gives me anxiety to start something that I know "isn't complete" or doesn't look super fantastic even if it checks all the boxes.

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Step one, turning on the computer, and step two, logging in to Canvas, are complete.

Also I need to stop doing the BlogFAQs thing but for some reason posting about my anxiety and making progress updates on this shit helps me for some reason.

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I now have a cover photograph and title... the train is building up steam >_>

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Perfection cant be a fixed thing like 0

Even 0 is set by the numbers before it and after it, it wouldnt make sense to count to 457733567633244 if 0 wasnt this thing you could always jump from

So you jump off perfection always I think, mostly cause numbers always change

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I do that, even with things that nobody really cares about.

Like sweepers. Took me a lot longer to sweep and dust a ladder well yesterday than it should have.

RedLuigi posted...

Perfection cant be a fixed thing like 0

Even 0 is set by the numbers before it and after it, it wouldnt make sense to count to 457733567633244 if 0 wasnt this thing you could always jump from

So you jump off perfection always I think, mostly cause numbers always change

I think I get it, but at the same time, I don't lmao. But thanks for the response and encouragement.

Esrac posted...

I do that, even with things that nobody really cares about.

Like sweepers. Took me a lot longer to sweep and dust a ladder well yesterday than it should have.

Always better to do a good job than to not, makes it easy to stand out amongst your peers and I think subordinates respect you more for it.

Man I wish I had a more traditional Navy experience... I know what sweepers are but I've never had to participate or even been on a ship or anything to ... see them.

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your need to be perfect probably masks some deep seated anxiety . what do u think will happen if your project is great but not perfect?

s_a_r_a_h posted...

your need to be perfect probably masks some deep seated anxiety . what do u think will happen if your project is great but not perfect?

Honestly I would even take "great" over the "mediocre" that I anticipate I will be submitting... even though the very first time I had to put a project like this together, last year, the professor loved it so much she wanted to use it as an exhibition to what the project should look like... And that required even more work.

It's weird, part of me is like "This is less work so I can put less effort into it, or start it later and be fine".

Part of me is afraid of the judgment, looking like an absolute idiot publishing something that looks OK but comparatively worse than what the rest of the class puts out.

I had this anxiety with my written essays last term though, too :|

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people are too busy thinking about themselves than to be thinking about you.

even if you did look like an idiot, nothing catastrophic would happen and no one will remember it tomorrow

i say this as someone with perfectionist tendencies.

Okay.

Your project is what? A presentation?

The presentation doesnt have to perfect to present a perfect idea perfectly well. People will not remember the presentation anyway. Regardless of what you do. But they might have room in their hearts for one or two perfect moments. A perfect takeaway. Your presentation may not be perfect, but their synopsis of it will be. Try to anticipate how people will react to what youre making and as always.....

Give it a good nights sleep and come back with a fresh set of eyes before making the final cut

s_a_r_a_h posted...

people are too busy thinking about themselves than to be thinking about you.

even if you did look like an idiot, nothing catastrophic would happen and no one will remember it tomorrow

i say this as someone with perfectionist tendencies.

lol normally this works, except we do have to review and critique other peoples' projects so for at least some brief period of time other people will be looking at it. also I care what the professor thinks >_>

Xethuminra posted...

Okay.

Your project is what? A presentation?

The presentation doesnt have to perfect to present a perfect idea perfectly well. People will not remember the presentation anyway. Regardless of what you do. But they might have room in their hearts for one or two perfect moments. A perfect takeaway. Your presentation may not be perfect, but their synopsis of it will be. Try to anticipate how people will react to what youre making and as always.....

Give it a good nights sleep and come back with a fresh set of eyes before making the final cut

It's kind of a presentation? It's called a Story Map, which is a visual way of exploring data and maps and stuff with context. It's just something people will read and scroll through, not an actual speech I have to give or anything.

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People will be very forgiving if you give them what they want. For example, super realistic superheroes + an interconnected film universe. Im willing to pull all my punches for a long time over something like that.

Oh, I thought the topic was about perfection itself as the subject for the presentation/essay/thing

In terms of finding out the line of effort, I think once you scan for how people get graded in other discussion posts and all that you can kinda gauge your level of commitment to a project. Its not worth killing yourself always, but as long as you connect the dots you need to connect and check off the list I think youre good.

Consult the rubric as far as the things you need and see how you can mark all of them without necessarily looking at them as a checklist.. have the rubric flow out as if you were naturally talking to someone who has no idea about what and what and that youll lose if you veer off too much >_>

I think its good to be thorough and if I enjoy the subject and know it Ill definitely
write a lot more.. its the fruit of my labor, its just sometimes I got shit to do too so Im like <_< >_> <_< >_>

think of what the teacher needs to do to teach you - then become 80% of that

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Damn that would be one hard ass topic to write about!

Thanks for your write-up, it helps a lot.

I am probably still going to stay up until 1 AM getting it done because I am dumb and can't just concentrate for one darned hour to move data over and clean everything up.

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Update - at almost 4 hours in, I have

title and cover image

-_-

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I imported one of my maps >_>

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11 PM, starting work on this in earnest.

I forgot how intuitive this platform is >_>. I will maybe share my finished product when I am done. Oh wait it has my name on it... hm.

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Shit it is 12:39 and I have barely made any progress on this -_-.

I think I like to put things off to the very last minute to further justify the idea that it isn't the best thing possible. If I'm like "I only had two hours to work on it!" then it is easier to swallow negative feedback, as opposed to if I invested a full week's worth of work into something and then it still sucked >_>

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I am getting creative and making my own inset maps with these photographs of locations that I took >_>

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Imagine the maps naked. That should help.

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Trumble posted...

Imagine the maps naked. That should help.

hot.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Thankfully no one seemingly has lol, I just wind up talking to myself half the time and then the topic dies.

I do appreciate your encouragement about that though!!

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It's probably a good thing I put this off because now I am triple and quadruple checking everything and realizing I overlooked a couple basic requirements and it would have sucked to miss points on easy stuff.

(also loaded a couple classmates' maps and they did not make the necessary adjustments in some cases -_-)

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I don't really have any advice, unfortunately. In my case it's usually desperation that makes me go from 'this must be perfect' to 'this must merely be good enough' but that brings its own stress with it, so...

Good luck with your project
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teep_ posted...

I don't really have any advice, unfortunately. In my case it's usually desperation that makes me go from 'this must be perfect' to 'this must merely be good enough' but that brings its own stress with it, so...

Good luck with your project

Thanks!
Do you also procrastinate until the last minute then to kind of help ease your way through it? Like knowing that you only have X amount of time to get it done means you just have to get it done with less tinkering?

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To an extent, but the last big thing I did, X amount of time was not enough to finish it
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teep_ posted...

To an extent, but the last big thing I did, X amount of time was not enough to finish it

That is always a fear.

ngl my b just clenched a little because I went to publish this thing and it said that there were a couple data layers that were not publicly shared... started panicking that I wouldn't be able to set them right >_> but that was an easy fix. Just don't like little surprises at the end.

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Whats scarier than something you know is coming?