The Cure For Perfectionism

Do you ever find yourself spending hours tapping away on your keyboard only to write one post? Most writers feel the same when they’re starting out. I used to be one of them.

I got scared that nobody would read my post. Or worse, people would leave negative comments.

I did anything to avoid publishing my writing. I stressed the tiniest detail and would be up all night editing. Or I’d think of a new idea to work on instead.

The result? I was burnt out while my audience count was still at zero and I watched other creators overtake me.

That is until I realised the problem wasn’t that I’m a perfectionist. It’s because I was afraid of rejection.

One day I came across a story known as The Potters Tale. A pottery teacher divided its class into two groups.

Group one had to make 30 pots in 30 days. Group two had to make only one pot in 30 days.

What happened? The best pots came from the group who produced 30 in 30 days.

Why? They learnt by doing, not thinking.

What does this mean? A true perfectionist embraces feedback, good or bad. Because it’s the only way to learn and improve your craft.

So how do you get over the fear of rejection and start publishing faster?

So don’t worry, today we’ll talk about how to embrace rejection and get over your perfectionism.

Here are 3 frameworks I use to get out of my head and create more: 

The Midwit approach.

You’ve probably seen this online. The key is to look for the approach that the genius and midwit both agree on. Don’t be the one who overcomplicates things.

Inverted Thinking

Charlie Munger made this concept famous. Ask yourself what actions you would have to take to not achieve your goal.

Want to become a great writer and grow an audience? Not publishing content, consuming more than you create and having no structure are great ways to avoid that goal. Great reminder when you catch yourself working on the wrong thing.

Embrace discomfort

The ability to embrace rejection is an undervalued trait. It will help you in any area of life. From finding a romantic partner to growing a business. So get your spoon out and learn to eat shit. Speak to that stranger and ask for criticism on your work. Get the reps in.

There you go. Anytime you find yourself avoiding the post button, come back here and remind yourself of how a true perfectionist will act. You’ll soon be churning out high-quality content on autopilot. 

Resources To Help You Write

📣 Great framework on storytelling from Shann Puri

✍🏻 6 frameworks from Dickie Bush to kick start your daily writing habit

🎥 Watch this to dive further into why your fear of being “bad” is holding you back

P.S. If you’re interested in having a newsletter like this written for you, then let’s chat.

Thank you for reading Tom’s Letter. I hope you find it valuable. If you did then forward it to a friend or share it on social. If you were a lucky one who had this forwarded to you, subscribe here.

Have a great week,

Tom ✌️

P.P.S. What did you think..