How well do you cope with your imperfections?
Does your body shape get you down?
Are you forever dissatisfied with the work you produce? Do you beat yourself up because your home is not perfectly tidy, or your car not as big as your neighbour’s?
Perfectionism is a tough way to live. Learning to live with our imperfections is a key to being more content with ourselves and our lives.
Let’s take a lesson from fruit and vegetables.
Our consumer obsession with buying perfectly shaped apples or carrots is a real problem. It’s the reason why vast amounts of perfectly fresh, tasty and nutritious veg is simply thrown away by producers every day without even reaching the shops.
I love how some supermarkets have now introduced ranges of these slightly misshapen fruit and veg under great names like ‘Perfectly Imperfect’.
They’re a bit wonky here and there, but if you chop them up and cook them, they’re fresh, they’re tasty, they’re nutritious. They are more than good enough.
In the same way, you and I need to learn to live with our own imperfections.
Yes, we all have flaws and scars and blemishes.
But here’s the thing: that doesn’t make us worthless.
So many people have internal messaging that tells them so, but it’s not true.
The Christian faith declares that you are deeply precious to God. He has filled your life with gifts and character and likes and loves that reflect God’s nature and his heart.
And when you work together with him there’s so much that He and you can do with all that, that can make a positive difference in the world.
You are not worthless or useless. You are perfectly imperfect. And that’s enough.
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The Revd Nick Hudson is Minister of Wokingham Baptist Church, writing on behalf of
Churches Together in Wokingham
