I saw an instagram pic on Elizabeth Foss‘s account today which was an encouragement in letting go of the journey for perfectionism.  You know the one, where you are running yourself and your family ragged doing everything and doing everything perfectly until you hit that snag and BOOM down comes the house of cards, leaving us wilted, frustrated and maybe even angry.

Elizabeth’s picture reminded me that we are our own worst enemies.  No one is tallying up our laundry piles, dirty dishes, extracurricular activities and perfect baked goods for the umpteenth bake sale.  We are the ones doing that, no one else.

The picture was perfectly timed for me today.  Hubby and I both had evening meetings tonight and somehow shuffling our daughter to cheer practice in between.  It’s been a long week and frankly, it’s been a long two weeks!  In this picture, it triggered something in me….the world WILL go on if I miss the occasional meeting (actually it will go on if I miss every meeting) and our evening will become a lot less hectic and rushed.  And I was able to give myself that permission.  Permission to let it go, permission to stop running for a minute and just catch my breath.  I was able to make dinner for my family (really good, see tomorrow’s post for recipe!), not stress about getting our daughter to practice–which was great since the Hubs hit traffic and never would have made it in time.  Time to shower.  In fact, Hubby also skipped his meeting.

It wasn’t a total bon-bon night, but it was a good breather and exercise in letting go of perfect.  An exercise I come back to time and again.

So, keep those Instagrams pretty but hey, let’s keep it real, too.  Life IS good, but it sure isn’t perfect and there is much encouragement in the reality.