You’re Not Too Good to Be Bad

The only way to be as good as you desire is to risk being as bad as you fear.

You’re not too good to be bad.

I recently wrote this in my journal while complaining to myself about my current creative block. I often use journaling as a personal coaching session where I become my own most frustrating, yet simultaneously intriguing client. I don’t shy away from giving myself the tough love I know I need to hear, the kind that encourages me to snap out of whatever self-pitying trance I’ve found myself in and recognize that I have more agency than I think I do. Most of my feelings of incapability stem from my conditioned perfectionism. This perfectionism permeates all areas of my life, to the point that I find myself emotionally and mentally paralyzed. My creative block is just another one of those instances of perfectionism paralysis.

What it really comes down to (as I’ve learned through my countless journal entries and lamentations on this topic) is the egoic belief that I am too good to be bad. That somehow being bad at anything—art, life, relationships, etc—isn’t for me, but for others who can afford to be bad. Those who can afford to be imperfect because their imperfection doesn’t threaten their survival in some way. Those of us who struggle with perfectionism can probably all attest to the fact that being imperfect is kind of a luxury. To us, those who can freely be imperfect are lucky. So lucky that they don’t have to hold themselves to the highest standards in order to maintain some semblance of okay-ness. Unlike us conditioned perfectionists, they’re not too good to be bad because they don’t see imperfection as a moral failing, but rather as a neutral expression of existence.