A friend of ours is a tattoo artist and the last time I saw him he told me he is not trying to recopy the exact image perfectly, the little mistakes in a tattoo are called ‘buddha‘.

I have grown up with the idea that I should be perfect. And if I was not, I should strive to be, or hide that I am not. It is a subconscious message that is brought to us over and over again by media and that we copy and communicate ourselves without even realizing. It was at the age of 18, doing my final exams, that I found out I was never going to be perfect. I was messing up, a lot. Having panic attacks, divorced parents, a chronic lack of sleep and a crush on Kurt Cobain who killed himself. The road to being perfect had too many gaps and bumps to ever become smooth. Still I have tried to be perfect in many ways, because it seemed to be the thing you just do. You try. And you fail. And then you try again. You do your best and at some point you just accept that doing your best is enough. That’s growing up.

Looking back on all my attempts to perfection, I see a funny pattern:
When I was the perfect snowboarder, I broke my arm and had to skip the winter.
When I was the perfect filmmaker, I got burned out and couldn’t work anymore.
When I was eating super healthy and was as thin as I wanted to be, I got anemia.
When I was the perfect wife, my marriage almost broke to pieces.
When I had the house all together, we got a dog that chewed on all our stuff and left hair just everywhere.
When I was the perfect mother, the children got hysterically out of hand.

What is the point of trying to be perfect? When you get there, life just shows you something else. It is beyond every point to work your hardest to be perfect and then get what you don’t want.

So I praise imperfection. Yay! I praise messy lives. Yay! I praise household quarrels, microwave pancakes for dinner, missing deadlines and happy bellies. Yay! Let’s get real about it and give us all a break! Let’s look for the buddha in what we do!