I struggle to fix the imperfection in myself and world around me

By David McElroy · January 10, 2021

I’ve always believed it was my job to fix the world. To make everything perfect.

I never actually said that. I didn’t even consciously think it. But I walked through the world feeling a sort of panic — a desperation to fix things — that most people never experience.

Looking back, it’s obvious now where that fear came from. As I was growing up, my narcissistic father held me responsible for being perfect. I was punished for any deviation from what he thought was right and good. And he constantly judged everybody and everything around me.

Behind their backs, he ridiculed people who did things incorrectly. If he saw a public mistake — a timing error on a live television show or a typo in a newspaper, for instance — he used to tell me that someone must have been fired for the mistake. And I believed him.

I’m still afraid of my own imperfection. I still feel panic when I see others’ mistakes. After all these years, there’s still a nagging feeling inside that I have to fix everything — or else I’ll be punished.

I read something a few minutes ago that suggested an affirmation for me to try. It said, “I now affirm that life is good and unfolding in miraculous ways.” I actually felt myself shudder when I read the line — and I realized just how off-kilter my reaction is.

I found myself feeling that old fear. The world is imperfect. Messed up. Wrong. Filled with mistakes. And everything is going to fall apart if I don’t fix things. What’s more, I’m a bad person — deserving of punishment — if I don’t point out all the errors and show others how they can fix themselves.

I consciously realize how ridiculous this is. I’m not perfect. I’ll never be perfect. I won’t even have a firm idea of what “perfect” should be. I know that a lot of what I believe is wrong. I realize that some of my judgement about what’s wrong — and what’s imperfect — about other people and in the rest of the world is completely wrong.

But on an emotional level, that makes me panic. I have to point out the imperfection around me. The idiocy. The mistaken beliefs. The poor reasoning. The dishonesty. The world is filled with these things. Lots of them are obvious to me. And I have the panicky feeling that I’m going to be in trouble if I don’t somehow fix everybody and everything.

It’s been 10 days since I stopped posting on Facebook. I still have times when I suddenly think of something I’d like to post there. I might have an interesting thought to share or maybe I’ve observed something funny. It feels strange not to have an outlet for those tiny thoughts which were Facebook posts but aren’t long enough to be worth articles here. But that’s not the biggest change I’ve noticed.

I’m not feeling the constant need to explain what others are getting wrong. I’m not reading the cacophony of dumb opinions and wrong assertions and confused reasoning. I’m not muttering under my breath about how stupid this person is or feeling frustrated that someone else is repeating irrational conclusions.

Staying away from Facebook — and from most other forms of social media — keeps me from seeing so much of the imperfection in the world that I’ve felt driven to fix. And it’s allowing me to spend more time with my own thoughts and feelings and errors and misperceptions.

More and more, I’m shutting out what I perceive as wrong with the world — whether I’m right or not — and it’s allowing me to focus once again on what I can actually do in my own life instead.

Those who know me best already understand that I’m held back by my fear of not being perfect at whatever I do. I’m afraid to write the scripts that I want to write, because they won’t be good enough. I’m afraid to make the short films that I’ve been struggling to make — much less the feature — because I fear the work wouldn’t be perfect. I’m afraid of people seeing just how imperfect I am.

Nobody expects me to be perfect except me. I know that. But it doesn’t stop me from wanting to pretend to be perfect. It doesn’t stop me from beating myself up every time I make any error. It doesn’t stop me from being angry and upset with myself about everything I publish for the world to see.

That’s especially true of my photos. Every time I publish something — even if it’s just to one of my Instagram accounts — I look at the work afterward and obsess about what’s wrong with it. I ran across the photo above — which I took last spring — earlier this evening, and I started beating myself up about all that’s wrong with it.

I live with that sort of obsessive self-criticism all the time. And I’m never going to live up to my natural talent and creative passions until I can get over this need to be perfect.

I can make some pretty nice things. Sometimes. When I’m not so terrified that I’m going to be punished for not being perfect.

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When I first told you about the project that would become DavidMcElroy.TV, I thought it would launch by mid-May. Since today is the last day of May — and I’m still not close to launching a finished product — here’s a brief update. The graphic above is the latest rough mockup of the format, but it’s still subject to change. Even the logo isn’t yet set in stone. Motion graphics are really difficult when you’re starting from scratch. Sunday night, my camera stopped recording, so it has to be sent off for repair. I have an older camera that I’ll keep using for testing, but I can’t launch without the better one. The audio system developed a low buzz this weekend that has me puzzled. I’ll be taking all the equipment over to the home of a local audio engineer who’s volunteered to help me figure out what I’ve done wrong. On top of all that, my on-camera performance seems to get worse with each test I do. There are days when I think I’m crazy to be attempting this. And in truth, I probably am insane to do it, but being crazy has never stopped me before. I’m at least a month away from launch and it could be a few months. Thanks for being patient — and thanks for all the support and enthusiasm for the project that you’ve sent my way.

I received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine Monday — and I’m happy to report that I’m neither dead nor a zombie controlled by Bill Gates and Co. Eligibility was recently opened in Alabama to everyone who’s 16 or older, so I signed up for the Pfizer vaccine at a site run by a local university. I know this is a political issue for a lot of people, but that honestly baffles me. We can disagree about whether such a vaccine should be mandatory — which I’m against — but as a voluntary choice, it seems like an easy choice now that it’s been safely given to millions of people. Is it a perfect preventative? Of course not. But the decision seemed obvious to me when looking at the statistics and evidence. I haven’t had any of the side effects that some people have experienced, but that’s supposed to be more of an issue after the second dose, which I’ll get on May 3. In the meantime, I’ll let you know if I grow a third arm — or if the secret microchip kicks in and someone starts trying to control me remotely. All kidding aside, getting the vaccine seems like a rational voluntary choice to me.

I get a lot of email from readers. Some of it is fascinating and useful. Some of it is full of confessions that people want to share with a stranger. Some people write to ask advice. What’s really surprising, though, is the small percentage that seems to come from mentally unbalanced people. When I started using the metaphor about being an alien — the tagline at the top of each page here — it never occurred to me that I’d start hearing from people who took it seriously. But every few months, I get a strange email — such as the one above from a few months back — from someone who seems to think I’m claiming to be an actual alien. The first time it happened, I laughed. By the time it became a semi-regular thing, I was simply appalled. For the record, I can provide no proof that I’m an alien, because … well … it’s just a metaphor. I do feel like an alien among human beings, but as far as I know, I’m just as earthbound as you are. It’s just a metaphor. Honest. Or at least, that’s what my lizard-beast overlords told me to say.

After Tampa Bay, Fla., musician Colt Clark had all of his gigs canceled last year for months on end, the entire family felt trapped at home as most of the world was on quarantine lockdown. His wife, Aubree, had an idea that would let Colt make music and involve the whole family in making music videos to share with their friends and family on Facebook. Aubree is a photographer and homeschooling mom to a daughter and two sons, who range in age from 6 to 11. After their friends started asking to share the videos, they made the performances public — and a few of them are now on YouTube, where they go by the name of Colt Clark and the Quarantine Kids. The younger son, Becket, is on drums. The older boy, Cash, plays keyboards, strings and guitars. Dad supplies lead vocals and plays guitar, while 6-year-old Bellamy mostly dances but sometimes does backup vocals. There’s even a dog who makes an occasional appearance. The Clark family has just raised the bar for what I need to create with my future children. And best of all, they seem to be having a great time together. I hope they make you as happy as they make me.

Have you ever wondered how the social media world works for so-called “influencers”? I find it comical, so I thought I’d share with you. I frequently get offers such as what I’m about to describe. And if I’m getting such offers — as a relative nobody in the online world — you can only imagine what people with huge audiences are offered. It starts with an email appealing to my ego: “We came across your online presence and we LOVE your style. We’d love to have you as one of our Brand Ambassadors. To celebrate our new [Brand Name] collection, we want to give you a FREE Watch so you can post a picture of you wearing it and drive more exposure to our brand.” Did you hear that? They love me. They want me to be seen wearing their cheap $59 watch so other people will think, “If this amazing influencer wears that, surely I should buy one.” They even offer me commissions on the watches sold from people clicking from my site. So the next time you see some alleged “influencer” touting something online or on social media, remember that this is what it’s probably all about. It’s laughable.

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