#theartofasking

As a writer—as an artist—I do not want to be wrong. Being told I’m wrong feels like driving into a dangerous dead end where every sign on the road screams DO NOT ENTER and red lights flash. I instinctively put my foot on the brake in my throat to keep my tongue from uttering the words “I don’t know.” My entire identity hangs in my belief of the way things work and my understanding of the world around me; if I am wrong, my concept of who I am hangs in the crosshairs. However, when I venture into the danger of asking for and taking advice from those who know more than me, I am capable of growing in ways I could never have imagined.

I was never the type of child to raise my hand in class to ask for clarification unless I believed the teacher to be wrong. When asked if I had any questions after a lecture or an instruction on how to complete a task, I would only open my mouth if I believed it would bring me attention or an opportunity to broadcast just how clearly I understood. To this day, I remember nearly all of my mistakes, and the corrections suggested of me, because of the heavy flood of shame that came with being wrong. I know now that this is perfectionism.

The idea of perfectionism is usually associated with someone who needs everything to be done perfectly to the standard of another person. In my case, however, perfectionism meant that the way I do things has to be perfect the first time or I may as well not do it again. For example, I taught myself how to play the piano as a teenager. I played only by ear. I never took a lesson. I quickly began writing my own songs and performing them for whoever would be willing to listen. My songs and my sound were mine alone. My identity as a musician was formed in my ability as an amateur. Though my chords were simple and a few of my fingers hovered in underuse, the sound I created was unique to me, which meant that it was unsusceptible to criticism. When a man told me a few years later that “if I practiced more, I could be good one day,” I promptly quit. It was as if he knew I was a failure and a fraud. The unique sound I believed I was creating had proven, to one man, that I was doing it “wrong,” and therefore I ought to never play again. I was afraid of finding out the truth of how bad I am as a person for not doing it perfectly from the start.

This concept of perfectionism does not exist without self-centered terminal uniqueness. Everyone else takes lessons for years and pays thousands of dollars to earn their stripes as an artist, but I am different. I have a carnal need to be prodigy or an anomaly. I am an artist from my bones whose medium is everything I touch, so that no one can be above or ahead of me. Not being the best at something causes a deep shame within me that threatens my ability to be ok as I am—to be perfect.  The problem is, I keep hitting dead ends. When I believe that my way is best no matter what, I am no longer teachable. Terminal uniqueness is my first line of defense against the shame of being wrong. When I am blazing a new trail by doing something no one else has done or in a way no one else has ever done it, I fend off those who believe they know better than me from teaching me something that could help me to grow.

In reality, admitting being wrong can only lead to gaining knowledge through receiving information from an outside source. Asking questions and asking for help lead to stronger connections with others, sharper skill sets, and refinement of habits that can propel the asker into deeper levels of understanding. Living a life of perfectionism in a cage of terminally unique talents has closed me off from connecting with those eager to see me grow. For much of my life I have relied on the value of talent while ignoring the value of skill. I have wanted to be seen for what I can offer in any given moment rather than my potential to get better. A silk flower is beautiful, but it cannot receive the love of a gardener’s tending, watering, and weeding. It does not change. I have lived my life thus far as a silk flower out of fear of wilting or browning without allowing myself to be nurtured into full bloom.

I have realized that these parts of myself as an artist have become liabilities, but I have the desire to change. My fear of shame has kept me in isolation and it has kept me from reaching my true potential as an artist. Wrapped up safely in the confines of my perfectionism and my need to be unique, my shame has incubated into a power greater than what my own ideas can contend. The only way to change this pattern of thinking—to allow myself to grow—is to admit that at the core of it all I think I’ve been doing it wrong. I need help. Now is the time to start asking for it and to start taking advice.