When you're passionate about something you want it to be all it can be. But in the endgame of life I fundamentally believe the key to happiness is letting go of that idea of perfection.
If virtue promises happiness prosperity and peace then progress in virtue is progress in each of these for to whatever point the perfection of anything brings us progress is always an approach toward it.
The great accomplishment of Jobs's life is how effectively he put his idiosyncrasies - his petulance his narcissism and his rudeness - in the service of perfection.
Look at our Lords disciples. One denied Him one doubted Him one betrayed Him. If our Lord couldn't have perfection how are you going to have it in city government?
As a real person he wouldn't last a minute would he? But drama is about imperfection. And we've moved away from the aspirational hero. We got tired of it it was dull. If I was House's friend I would hate it. How he so resolutely refuses to be happy or take the kind-hearted road. But we don't always like morally good people do we?
The God we serve does not seek out the perfect but instead uses our imperfections and our shortcomings for his greater good. I am humbled by my own limitations. But where I am weak He is strong.
The Word of God well understood and religiously obeyed is the shortest route to spiritual perfection. And we must not select a few favorite passages to the exclusion of others. Nothing less than a whole Bible can make a whole Christian.
God who is eternally complete who directs the stars who is the master of fates who elevates man from his lowliness to Himself who speaks from the cosmos to every single human soul is the most brilliant manifestation of the goal of perfection.
Love is friendship that has caught fire. It is quiet understanding mutual confidence sharing and forgiving. It is loyalty through good and bad times. It settles for less than perfection and makes allowances for human weaknesses.
Jazz stands for freedom. It's supposed to be the voice of freedom: Get out there and improvise and take chances and don't be a perfectionist - leave that to the classical musicians.
Freedom from care and anxiety of mind is a blessing which I apprehend such people enjoy in higher perfection than most others and is of the utmost consequence.
God's forgiveness allows us to be honest with ourselves. We recognize our imperfections admit our failures and plead to God for clemency.
The goodness of a thing created is the perfection of its fitness for the use which it serves. Now that use is either particular or universal.
Have no fear of perfection - you'll never reach it.
Advance and never halt for advancing is perfection. Advance and do not fear the thorns in the path for they draw only corrupt blood.
March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection. March on and fear not the thorns or the sharp stones on life's path.
I think every chef not just in America but across the world has a double-edged sword - two jackets one that's driven a self-confessed perfectionist thoroughbred hate incompetence and switch off the stove take off the jacket and become a family man.
Practice means to perform over and over again in the face of all obstacles some act of vision of faith of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.
Success is the result of perfection hard work learning from failure loyalty and persistence.
The perfection of our union especially our commitment to equality of opportunity has been a story of constant striving to live up to our Founding principles. This is what Abraham Lincoln meant when he said 'In giving freedom to the slave we assure freedom to the free - honorable alike in what we give and what we preserve.'
A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add but when there is nothing left to take away.
In order to go on living one must try to escape the death involved in perfectionism.
Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections.
Perfection is immutable. But for things imperfect change is the way to perfect them.