A cliche that is often quoted to people working on sophisticated projects is "The perfect is the enemy of the good". Alex Lickerman M.D. on the web site of Psychology Today answers two questions.
- Why Perfect Is The Enemy Of Good
- Why obsession with perfection can paralyze.
Urban Planning? What helps to release me from the compulsion to create perfection, I've found, is striving to put into proper perspective the importance of the act of creation itself. When I'm immersed in the creative process, nothing feels more important to me at that moment than the thing which I'm creating. And though that sense of importance is what drives my passion and discipline (which in turn is what makes creating it possible at all), it also represents the source of the painful sense of urgency for the final result to be perfect. Forcing myself, then, to recognize that in the grand scheme of life no one thing is so important to me or anyone else that failing to make it perfect will permanently impair my ability to be happy is what frees me from the need for it to be perfect. Freed then from the need to attain the unattainable, I can instead focus on enjoying the challenge of simply doing my best. Because if we allow ourselves to remain at the mercy of our desire for perfection, not only will the perfect elude us, so will the good.1I suggest an example from the work on the Venus Project and Resource Based Economic might be expressed in the table below.
The "perfect" solutions may be a "bridge too far" for people who do agree with the examples in the "good" column. The implementation of the "good" requires efforts in organization and leadership that will bring people onside and provide a constituency open to moving toward perfection after their experience with the good.
1(2011, June 26). Why Perfect Is The Enemy Of Good | Psychology Today. Retrieved April 13, 2020, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/happiness-in-world/201106/why-perfect-is-the-enemy-good
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