Striving to be less perfect

This might sound like an odd sentiment, but it's something I'm trying really hard to achieve. I wrote about my new years resolutions in my last post of 2011 and as we're closing to the end of January, it might be a good idea to look back on them. Just to make sure I'm making some progress...

In that post, it's the points 3 and 5 that are the tough ones for me. 3. Less thinking, more creating and 5. Stress less.

I've always been hard pressed for perfection. It's a good quality to have and I do realize that, but it does hinder me on occasion as well. This is especially hard when trying to be creative. Now, anything I sell in my shop has to be the best. I make sure that they are, in effect, perfect. Everything should be perfect in a sense of construction, no fraying edges, no wrinkles and no smudges. That is a given to me and nothing less than perfect in that sense will ever make it to the shop.

However, when you are crafting, you should allow room for things that are less than perfect. Otherwise, all your time goes into trying to achieve the unattainable. And this is exactly where I run into problems. As much as I strive for perfection with my business, I need to allow some room for error and creativity.

So, I'm taking on additional projects that will hopefully allow me to try out things, without worrying about the results so much. The first one: mail art.

This is a topic I will come back to with some more concrete examples as I get things done. This is my goal of the week, create something fun and random without a plan ahead of time.

I'll report back with the results.

How do you manage being creative and not worry about the result?