Perfection?

I remember clearly the day that my boss at THE USA TODAY said that I was a perfectionist.  I laughed as some of you are laughing right now.  After giving it too much thought I came to the conclusion that I agreed with her, but only with things I felt were really important. (such as work)  To me, most things aren't that important and many of them can be done in a lot of different ways with decent results.

None of us are perfect, but some of us are exceptional at doing certain things.  For instance, two nights ago history was made in the sports world.  Mariano Rivera, the retired New York Yankee reliever, was elected into The Baseball Hall of Fame.  It was an incredible achievement, but the history part of it was this: he became the first player elected unanimously on 100% of all the ballots. 

It's not important to explain how they vote for The Hall of Fame, only that it was the first time someone was elected on every single ballot.  Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Lou Gherig, and Ted Williams, none of them were elected unanimously.  It had never happened in all of the 82 years of The Baseball Hall of Fame.  Not only was Rivera's performance on the field great, but he has always been an ideal role model and exceptional human being.

Was he perfect? He was not.  He gave up an opposite field home run late in a 1997 playoff game, committed a throwing error that lost the seventh game of the 2001 World Series, and he could not hold leads against the Boston Red Sox in the 2004 Championship Series which led to the Red Sox winning The World Series.

He was honored the other night not for his flaws or failures, but for his achievements.  He led the Yankees to five World Championships and was clearly the best pitcher coming out of the bullpen ever.  He did not have to be perfect to be the greatest at what he did.

Sometimes we spend too much time focusing on our flaws and not on our achievements.  We don't have to be perfect in anything we do, but if we focus on being the best, great results will eventually come.  We will never be elected to a Hall of Fame, but by pursuing excellence we will have the satisfaction of knowing we succeeded in doing something extremely well.