{"id":665,"date":"2007-04-24T22:57:04","date_gmt":"2007-04-24T22:57:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/04\/the_oppression.shtml"},"modified":"2021-05-29T02:45:34","modified_gmt":"2021-05-29T02:45:34","slug":"the_oppression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/04\/the_oppression.shtml","title":{"rendered":"The Oppression of Perfection"},"content":{"rendered":"

I haven’t written much of substance around here of late, aside from my on going Quiet Time Journal<\/a> study of Ezekiel. That’s been a surprisingly enjoyable study thus far and your encouraging words on it are appreciated. I’m at a point where I enjoy my reading and look forward to it, a place I haven’t been in a long time.
\nBut aside from that, and my Blogwalking<\/a> posts, not much of substance has happened around here. I’ve found myself in a low spot lately. It seems that life has been conspiring against me of late. The ongoing issues with my car (still unresolved), lots of things around the house to fix and deal with, it’s time to get the T’bird out and I again didn’t get any projects on it done over the winter, etc. They seem trivial, but somehow they all add up to a feeling of hopelessness that hangs over me. It seems like I’m always chasing problems and issues.
\nWelcome to life, right?
\nWhat I’ve begun to understand is how I’ve bought into the idea that things can be perfect and right. There’s a right way, the<\/em> right way, and I should seek it and obtain it. So, I think somehow that if I wash my car enough, keep the salt off, change the oil at the proper time, etc it will be shiny, new and perfect forever. If I study enough, read enough, pray enough and think enough I’ll achieve spiritual perfection. I’ll know how to do church, which church is the<\/em> church and who’s a Christian and who isn’t. If I finish this and that project around the house, put up that last piece of trim, pain that wall and get the patio done, I won’t have to work on the house any more, it’ll be right.
\nIngrained in me in my upbringing & our culture of the past few decades is this idea that problems have individual, absolute and final solutions. It’s the American ‘can do’ spirit, a Bob The Builder attitude (“Can we fix it? Yes we can!”) that believes inherently that we are able to find all the answers and fix anything.
\nThis pursuit of perfection, more over the belief that we can obtain and sustain it, is ultimately a lie. Worse yet, is once you’ve bought into it, even when you discover the lie, the mindset still lives in you, pushing you toward The Answer, even though you know it does not exist. I’ve long understood that things break, people fail, truth can be elusive and ‘fuzzy’ and that questions pile up faster than the answers. Yet, I still act as if that weren’t true. In my heart, I want it all just so<\/em>, just perfect, just right.
\nI’ve come to understand that this pursuit of perfection is oppressive to the core. It drags my soul down. Why? Well, for one, it is unobtainable. Things rot and decay. A freshly washed car immediately starts gathering dirt. (In fact, just washing the car reveals all the latest scratches and dings that the layer of grime was hiding!) Problems multiply. Questions abound. But the real reason that it’s oppressive is because the heart behind it is inherently selfish. The reason to pursue perfection is to free time that would have been spent on problems for me and my plans. I’m not pursuing some high minded standard, I’m pursuing my own leisure, what I think will make me happy.
\nI think that by avoiding work and making more time for fun, I will be happy or fulfilled. The work is in the way, a necessary evil in life that must be endured to get to what I want to do. The cold truth is the opposite – God is a worker and He created us to work too. There is satisfaction in the work invoved to complete tasks and meet needs. When I seek to fix all the problems and find all the answers and put it all to bed for good, what I’m really saying is I want to avoid God’s plan for me – to work and serve – and follow my plan – to relax and indulge.
\nGod is at work, He created me to be at at work too. There will always be work to do. Rather than seeking to empty my to do list so I can get to the good stuff, I need to embrace the idea of the work being<\/em> the good stuff. It’s not the means to an end, in many ways it is the end itself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I haven’t written much of substance around here of late, aside from my on going Quiet Time Journal study of Ezekiel. That’s been a surprisingly enjoyable study thus far andRead More The Oppression of Perfection<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe Oppression of Perfection - salguod.net<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2007\/04\/the_oppression.shtml\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Oppression of Perfection - salguod.net\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I haven’t written much of substance around here of late, aside from my on going Quiet Time Journal study of Ezekiel. 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This shows the decline and fall of salguod.net. Back nearly seven years ago (yikes) when I started this thing I was pretty prolific, posting nearly 4 times a week for the first two years. Alas, each year had fewer posts than\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Salguod.net stuff"","block_context":{"text":"Salguod.net stuff","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/salguod-net-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"Annual Posts 2004-2010","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.salguod.net\/weblog\/assets_c\/2010\/12\/annual_posts_2004-2010-thumb-500x397-1856.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":376,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2005\/08\/before_i_get_ca.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":665,"position":1},"title":"Before I Get Carried Away","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"August 30, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Boy, I'm having serious flashbacks going on here. On one hand, it seems like 1979 all over again, with Kip \"Calling out the Remnant\" from the ICOC now, just like he did with the COC shortly after taking the reigns at the Boston Church of Christ (then the Lexington COC).\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "God and Church"","block_context":{"text":"God and Church","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/god-and-church"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":586,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2006\/11\/spread_thin.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":665,"position":2},"title":"Spread Thin","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"November 15, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"(NOTE: My web host is going to be doing maintenance on the server that hosts my site Thursday evening. salguod.net will be down from 7:00 PM eastern through Midnight.) Not much activity her of late, sorry about that. I really haven't had much to say. Not sure why, but part\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Other stuff"","block_context":{"text":"Other stuff","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/other-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":312,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2005\/04\/its_been_quiet.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":665,"position":3},"title":"It’s Been Quiet Around Here","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"April 22, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Sorry I haven't written much of late. I've been spending my computer time tweaking my site and reading other blogs. I have some cool upgrades to implement soon including a means for commenters to edit their own posts. I realize, however, that the half a dozen folks (I think that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Salguod.net stuff"","block_context":{"text":"Salguod.net stuff","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/salguod-net-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":760,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2008\/01\/i_think_i_need.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":665,"position":4},"title":"I Think I Need a Break","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"January 8, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm coming to a conclusion that I've been trying to avoid for a long time. Avoid it while, ironically, implementing it by failing to post anything of substance. I need to take a break, of sorts, from blogging. I've felt like posting some stuff, felt I should be posting some\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Salguod.net stuff"","block_context":{"text":"Salguod.net stuff","link":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/salguod-net-stuff"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":203,"url":"https:\/\/salguod.net\/blog\/2004\/09\/why_blog.shtml","url_meta":{"origin":665,"position":5},"title":"Why blog?","author":"Doug Schaefer","date":"September 27, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"While I'm on the subject of not writing much, I'd like to comment on the purpose of blogging. I do this blog mainly because writing brings clarity to my thoughts. There's just something about putting words to the page that helps to crystallize things. 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