Permission to Suck: When Preparation Becomes Paralysis
Starting any kind of "work" amidst what to me looks like chaos and an incessant stream of distractions is a challenge. Starting "creative" / "knowledge" work even more so, of course.
Somehow along the way, I have internalized this idea that to do anything at least mildly cognitively challenging and something that requires at least a bit of focus and concentration, I need to have a "perfect" environment. I need to get myself and everything around me "ready". And if anything is a just a bit off, even by a freaking inch, real "work" ain't happening. Or at least it's not being done in the best way possible.
So, for me to be able to really sit down and start working on my current serious-ish project or even writing this very post, I need to have closed all the outstanding loops. Yes, I have this thing with closing loops and apparently feel totally thrown out of whack when they are not closed.
Here's a somewhat random and unstructured list of things that need to have happened or be true, for me to be able to start doing the "real work". See if you can recognize yourself.
The serious work needs to be done first things in the morning or as early as possible during the day. Our batteries are depleted as the day rolls on, we're being told. So, if real work hasn't happened early in the day, I might just as well not do it today and do it right tomorrow.
I must have taken a shower, ideally a cold one, of course, to feel fresh and energized. I need to put on clean clothes to feel even fresher and look semi-professional.
I need to have ingested the perfect amount of caffeine. I need to have eaten just enough not to start feeling hungry as soon as the first pomodoro interval is over. But at the same time, not so much that I am starting to feel sluggish. The line is thin.
I need to have tackled all the mess and straightened things out in the living/work space because any kind of mess is -- yes -- open loops and "visual distractions". This is actually a big one. I can get sidetracked for hours if not days trying to get my "environment" ready. I bet we've all been there. I think this is also what people will call quintessential "procrastination".
I must not be interrupted by anyone or anything. No noise, no notifications, no other people around. No nothing. Not even distracting thoughts. Just the quite pristine isolated environment. Because this is how real work gets done, right?
I must have enough time at my disposal to do a "solid", "meaningful" chunk of "work", because if not, why even bother. This is also big. If I had to guess, I probably lost days and weeks because of this one alone.
Then there's the good ol' complexity. In many shapes or forms. Complex systems need a lot of maintenance -- just ask this guy and he'll be happy to tell you. If my work relies on a complex system, of course, I will need "fix" whatever is not ideal or working perfectly yet first, before getting real work done. Because if something is a bit off, it's an open loop, and it needs closing before the environment becomes "perfect". And, honestly, there's always something that is not ideal with a complex system. The opposite seems to be at least partially true as well.
But complexity it's not only about what's already there. It's also about what is not there yet: whatever I am trying to produce -- be it a research-ish project or writing a blog post just like this one, it has to be complex, intricate, and carefully thought through. If I am not sure it's going to be that way, I will be inclined to put off starting/doing the thing forever.
Some people might say that this last one is "perfectionism". Ok, at least now I know what to call it. Thanx. On a more serious note, I do know now that I am afraid that whatever I do is going to suck. And this is putting it mildly. And by the same token, I am afraid of criticism. And this is putting it even more mildly. I am now old enough to finally admit this to myself. I am afraid this post sucks and I feel the urge to keep polishing and refining it forever. But this time, I am not going to. (So, if you feel the writing here sucks at times, it's not you -- it probably does. And for the first time in my life, I am semi-proud about the fact.)
I have come to believe that in my case there's one common denominator for most if not all of these things mentioned above. A good contender for that is actually what is described in the paragraph above. We may keep calling it perfectionism. But I think a more revealing introspectively arrived at explanation (this probably sounds very clumsy, but I'll go with that) is that I am hard wired to make absolutely sure that I have accounted for all the possible contingencies of a choice and have made sure this is the best choice to make given all said contingencies (this probably sounds even clumsier, but I'll go with that as well for therapeutic reasons).
So, me compulsively having to make sure that everything is perfect before I "just start doing the damn thing" is me making sure I have considered all the possible factors that can negatively impact the process and/or the product. And that the "doing" of the "thing", once chosen, is the best possible choice that could have been made at this point in time. Because if it not, the best choice could have been doing something else!
I can actually trace the same logic with all the other things that I have delayed or procrastinated on. I have a suspicion that this could be the main cause of my perceived failed life in general, but I am not going to go that far. Yet. Let me just say that one of the reasons I haven't posted here on this blog after the first two initial posts in the summer of 2025 is that I couldn't decided whether to build my own site using Hugo (like a real nerd would) or to just stay put and continue using bearblog.dev (like a savvy normie probably would).
Now that I can clearly see this loop running over and over again in with almost everything, I am starting a war on it. This post is one of the first battles. To hell with perfectionism. To hell with complexity. To hell with trying to plan for all the possible contingencies. I am allowing myself to not think everything through. I am allowing myself to suck. Big time, if I must.
P.S. I haven't even proof-read this post sufficiently. And this is the main point.
Originally posted: 2026-05-05