Guest Post: Becoming perfect. Being perfect, Growth.

A few weeks ago my friend Carrie, who is incredibly wise and insightful, shared some thoughts on what "becoming perfect" really means. I loved what she had to say and asked her if she would be willing to share. Lucky for us, she agreed:

When I graduated high school, I seemed pretty stereotypical of an over-achieving
American Mormon kid. I was a good student. I had talents. I am a Caucasian. I can
be cheerful. I worked hard. Up until that point, everything made sense. I didn’t have
sex cause I was too young and I didn’t want to get married or get pregnant. I didn’t
want to drink alcohol or do drugs because I saw the impacts of that on many of my
friends. I had amazing church leaders who truly served and exemplified Christ and
doing good. After graduating high school, I realized that there was a “traditional”
path that was in front of me that I was told would lead to my happiness and well-
being. Being a dutiful Mormon, I did my best to follow that path, but sometimes
at the cost of what I thought was really my true path. These points of divergence
from the “traditional path” and what felt like “my path” included transferring
from an aggressive art program to BYU, not going on a mission due to a prospect
of marriage, getting married young despite my desires to develop other talents
outside of a marriage, and trying to rationalize and defend aspects of church policy
or practice that fundamentally were opposed by my conscience. These points of
divergence left me feeling stagnant and somewhat powerless in many areas of my
life.

I believe that following this “traditional path” is the tool that many of use in our
pursuit to become perfect. Maybe for you this traditional path includes getting
married before the age of 25 and/or having 3-7 children before the age of 32. Maybe
for others it is having the angelic and meek nature of many women. For others it may
be becoming more domestic or serving all the time. For others it may be abiding by all
the rules from the handbook, even after your mission. For others it is about maintaining
that perfect figure. For others it may be avoiding pain. Many elements of this traditional
path are good and worthy aspects of what may constitute anyone’s path. But I
worry that we may be selling ourselves short by limiting our path and goals to these
basic checklist items that avoid pain, which may lead us to make decisions and take
actions which leave us feeling incomplete, unsatisfied, or stalled.

In an attempt to re-asses what “becoming perfect” was really about. I started
thinking about what I would tell my 18-year-old self. I would challenge her to
think about what would actually make her become the woman God wanted her to.
I would let her know that her feelings of being guided by God to work and travel
internationally and address gross human rights concerns were truly inspired. I
would let her know that she shouldn’t go to BYU because it was culturally such a
poor fit for her. That pain she saw around her in the form of poverty, depravity,
depression, etc. was not necessarily a sign of things going wrong that she had to fix,
but one more layer to the portrait that would become her image. I would let her
know that she should not be surprised that her dancing and artistry was not just a
hobby, but did not have to be a professional pursuit for it to be a gift from God that
she should maintain throughout her life. I would tell her that she should let the shelf
break that held all of her concerns about the church; this break would be the most
honest way for her to trust God and expand her faith.

In short, I would tell this 18 year old version of myself that most of the challenges
she might face would cause sorrow and may temporarily make her different than
others, but it would also produce a richness and texture in her life that would
create the layers and fullness that makes life worth living. I would remind her that
many of the layers on the canvas would be on top of each other covering pervious
understanding and image. But they would also add the literal depth to the painting.
Other times the paint would blend with elements from a previous tradition and
sometimes it would clash and a hard decision would need to be made about what
paint was to be used. But the overall goal, was that you ended up painting the
picture of what God wanted you to become in your life. As long as I’ve done that,
I’ve felt as though I’ve been honest with my God, with myself and am growing in a
way to become perfected through out life.

- Carrie