excellence vs. perfectionism

the band leaders are reading heart of the artist and the next chapter up for discussion is entitled excellence vs. perfectionism. excellence is what our team strives for, but finding the balance between laziness, excellence, and perfectionism is hard.

excellence: doing the best we can with what we have. this doesn't mean we have to nail every performance, or that there can't be mess ups. but it means we come well prepared, and perform the the best of our abilities. it means not only preparing before performance, concentrating during performance, and EVALUATING after performance. if no evaluation takes place, we are not interested in excellence. we are not interested in improving.

laziness: doing just enough to get by like and not pushing ourselves to grow.
i think a lot of musicians follow into this trap. if i'm in the band every sunday, i sometimes slip into this. i can nail that harmony, even though i didn't practice it that much. i think this affects musicians of all levels, but can often be a particular disease for the more talented or skilled musicians--thinking they can get by, because maybe they'll still come off sounding really good. this isn't excellence. this is laziness. what if we really pushed ourselves to grow. just because no one will know if we sound great on stage, and it's average for us...we could be so much more, and SHOULD be if we are to honor what God's given us. if he gifted us with extraordinary talents, it is our responsibility to be the BEST musicians we can with the potential we are given...not just better than someone else, or good enough to get by.

perfectionism: nothing is ever good enough for us. ridiculing ourselves with contempt over every mistake. growing tired of using our gifts because we are never satisfied with our performance. not accepting compliments, seeing the good in things, because we are too bent on being perfect. perfectionism goes destructively beyond the pursuit of excellence. excellence seeks to show up and honor God by doing the best we can with what he's given us. perfectionism seeks to glorify ourselves by not ever making mistakes. when we are assuming we can be perfect, we are forgetting we are human and broken, and artists in need of a savior.

i struggle a great deal to find the balance here. i have been watching meaningfulchurch today. something that's long overdue. it is ridiculous that i have access to video of all of our performances, and i often don't watch them. and when i do, i come away mixed. honestly, i spend the first half of the process feeling dejected. the perfectionist in me feels disheartened, critical, frustrated..."i thought it sounded better than that!" and all i can see are the flaws and imperfections in our performances. and i wonder what kind of morale that builds when i come to the team with that heart.

yet, there is another half of me that feels fired up. i want to do whatever it takes to help us improve. and i feel energized by the performances too--we did some awesome stuff. how incredible that each week our team achieves at this level. i feel like God has used these services to impact others and that makes me excited. it also drives me to...yes, EVALUATION!!!

i will try to put my perfectionist self in one corner, and not see only the negative, but i will also put my lazy self in another and not skip the eval process. instead, let's encourage each other for what went well, but let's fix what didn't!

my husband often reminds me that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

in some ways, i feel like our team is a bit insane. we're pretty good at what we do, gang. but we could improve some things soooo easily, if we would just watch, listen and evaluate. and i believe that is the kind of excellence that honors God. i'm not asking us to be perfectionistic and point out every little flaw, or to ever feel like nothing is good enough. but i am asking that we do the best we can with what we have--and one thing we have is a website with which to evaluate ourselves.

will you join me in pursuing excellence?

1. let your mistakes go--we don't expect you to be perfect!
2. watch yourselves REGULARLY on meaningful church. consider what you did well, and what could be improved.
3. join in the evaluation process when given the opportunity, or create opportunity by shooting out an email to encourage someone, or to give some feedback on what could be improved. (you can send these to me, if you like).

i can't believe how far we've come--it's incredible. i can't believe what we will look like in 5 years. will you join me in getting there?