I don’t have to be perfect at everything. Heck, I don’t even need to TRY to be perfect at everything. I need to figure out how to remember that when I want to hurt myself.

I think the (totally unrealistic) desire to be absolutely perfect at everything is messing up my life more than anything else right now. I spend all my time thinking about everything I can’t do, rather than doing the things I can. Or thinking about everything I’ve ever done wrong in the past, rather than taking action right now. All these conflicting ideas about all the different stuff I’m supposed to do “perfectly” or “right” just distract me from the things I actualy do love & hold me back in those areas.

Like, two of my biggest worries right now don’t even have anything to do with the things I really care about.

I used to be really serious about music, and I’ve recently quit playing my instrument altogether. I don’t regret it and I don’t miss it, because my passion for music was really fizzling out and I discovered that I’m much better at (and more interested in) mathematics. But I feel like I never really got good enough at music. I played for years and was never all that good (even though I worked pretty hard at it). I always felt like I let down whatever musical group I was in by not being good enough. And there’s a part of me that won’t let go of that–that thinks I need to “make it all up” by going back and working harder until I’m a really good musician. But I wasn’t enjoying it anymore. Doesn’t it make more sense just to let go of it and put my energy into what I actually do love?

The other thing that’s continually bothering me is my looks. Which is stupid, because I actually don’t care that much about how I look. I just feel like others are going to judge me based on it. Well, if they do, I don’t care. I have better things to do than worry about what people think.