Appreciating imperfection, further analysis...

Hi, today i have come across another idea for further review. Today at work someone's personality i would normally respond too negatively inspired a new reaction/ understanding. That understanding became what i now refer too as appreciating imperfection as perfect. It pretty much gave me an entirely new perspective on how i want to begin dealing with personal interactions in the future.

Has anyone else come across this and what do you think?

onequestion
Hi, today i have come across another idea for further review. Today at work someone's personality i would normally respond too negatively inspired a new reaction/ understanding. That understanding became what i now refer too as appreciating imperfection as perfect. It pretty much gave me an entirely new perspective on how i want to begin dealing with personal interactions in the future.

Has anyone else come across this and what do you think?

I am not sure I'm entirely understanding your precise "epiphany," here, but appreciate you had one, of a sort. What I do think, is your OP, in general, is a great concept to investigate, as so much of our socialization, increasingly, is about the seeking of perfection, and I believe this to be to our detriment.

Just an incomplete and not great metaphor of what I mean: when I'm doing artwork, I find that frequently my mistakes, or departure from the plan of what I'm intending to depict, draw, pain, etc., perceived at that moment as a mistake, often adds something great to the piece I never would have expected.

But don't our imperfections, and those of everything and everyone, give us part of the depth of our character, and especially our reaction to them?
Tetra

reply to post by tetra50


Yes, precisely.

onequestion
Hi, today i have come across another idea for further review. Today at work someone's personality i would normally respond too negatively inspired a new reaction/ understanding. That understanding became what i now refer too as appreciating imperfection as perfect. It pretty much gave me an entirely new perspective on how i want to begin dealing with personal interactions in the future.

Has anyone else come across this and what do you think?

It is all a matter of perspective. When dealing with people you have no idea about what their day/life has been like. Before you judge someone and react to them negatively you should at the very least know a little about them outside of work or school or whatever your situation. A good example, when I was in high school there was one girl I could not stand. We never got along. She was just so negative all the time towards me and everyone else. It went on like that for years. Long story short. It turned out she had an abusive father. After I actually got past myself and talked to her like a human being instead of having my knee jerk she's a beeyotch reaction, we ended up going out for a while and she turned out to be one of my favorite people. Still is. I have countless examples but that's just one. Listen to this song, I think it explains what I am trying to say a little better than I can. It's brilliant.

Having a little empathy can open up whole new worlds of wonderful people to you. Cheers

reply to post by tetra50

departure from the plan of what I'm intending to depict, draw, pain, etc., perceived at that moment as a mistake,

one of the things I most appreciate about great jazz musicians is when they accidentally stray from the original intent of a solo, and then crawl and scrape their way back to the theme without skipping a beat using alternative patterns and intonations.

reply to post by TerryMcGuire


True, and that's what distinguishes the greatness of jazz musicians, in many ways, from other more classically oriented, as most jazz performance is improvisational…..
Tetra

Sometimes an imperfection is the key to beautiful relationships- a weakness, a need, can be the opening for another to experience giving, or doing for you.

I remember a day that made an impact on me...
I was working as a cashier at the time. I was a fairly good looking woman, yet have always struggled with acne as well, which I believed made me quite repulsive to others- yet I still got more attention from men then I felt comfortable with, which I couldn't quite understand.

One day I was busy working, had a line of customers in front of me, and deeply engrossed in what I was doing. I had my eyes down looking at the drawer as I closed it, and suddenly heard a mans voice say, "Her acne is quite touching" and my head snapped up.
Before me was a man, perhaps thirty-ish, good looking, and with one of those glossy eyed dumb smiles on his face that men get when they are just taken with a woman. I realized he hadn't spoken outloud- I had picked it up on another level, (which happens sometimes, if I am not alert to blocking it out).

I suddenly got a perception of myself through his eyes that totally surprised me and I had never considered before- the fact that I had a few zits made a certain charm. Otherwise, my beauty comes off as being sort of the glacial blond- intimidating. The acne revealed my vulnerability, my sensitivity, my fragility, which gave a certain charm. In the way the fragility of a flower or butterfly is part of it's beauty.

For days I reflected on that idea, on what I considered a horrible defect as "touching" to others... it was a strange and new concept for me. It made me more aware of how I also feel drawn towards certain imperfections in others, and how they are very much a part of the charm of the individual.

reply to post by onequestion


No one is perfect. Everyone is imperfect. Every single person on this rock is different. There never has been or ever will be a perfect person. That's what makes it so beautiful. IMHO

I have always viewed perfection as unattainable and imperfection as a quality or attribute of something that is existent and alive. Anything that is perfect and unchanging is essentially dead, it cannot evolve any further because there is nothing to improve upon. Yet these same attributes are used to describe the divine, make you own conclusions on this contradiction...

The Japanese strive for perfection in arts and handicrafts, yet they also value the imperfection and small mistakes whether intentional or accidental in utensils for example for tea ceremony and interior decoration. It seems like in order for something to be perfect in human terms, it has to include a small degree of imperfection to be appreciated as perfect. Just think of the classical beauty mark on a persons face... Why is a single mole considered a 'beauty mark' on an otherwise perfect visage?