Progress Over Perfection: The Pursuit of Excellence

Welcome to the Optimizing Beyond podcast. I'm Josh Negron, and this show is all about sharing lessons, ideas, and strategies that sharpen your thinking, strengthen your habits, and push you to grow beyond comfort zones. Let's dive in. Today we're going to be talking about progress over perfection and how to pursue excellence instead If you've been following since episode one, thank you for being part of this early journey. In episode one, we talked about discernment, knowing when to speak and when to stay silent. In episode two, we explored how belief and expectation shape what's even possible. And in episode three, we uncovered how focus is the rarest currency in the distracted world. Today's topic ties them all together because perfectionism. Kills all 3 if left unchecked. Today we're diving into one of the biggest traps that keeps even high achievers stuck: the pursuit of perfection. It sounds good on the surface, but there's an underbelly to it. We'll explore how to replace it with progress and the pursuit of excellence, and how to build systems to pursue that excellence and free yourself from the fear of not being ready. Think about it. Why do we chase perfection when it keeps us from often progressing? There's something that you wanna do and you wanna perfect it. You wanna do it well. You wanna execute at a high level, but it's just never quite right. So you really never do deliver. What if progress instead of perfection was the real mark of mastery? What if that's how you do get better at things instead of obsessing about one thing? How do you know when something's good enough to move forward? That's such a hard question. How do you know when something's ready to be shipped? That's something we'll talk about today. Where in your life are you stuck polishing instead of publishing? We'll look into those answers and more. Let's get into why perfection looks productive, but is really just procrastination wearing a mask. So where does excellence come from? I believe it comes from consistency, not perfection. The trap of perfectionism is thinking that good is not good enough. It feels noble, perfectionism, but honestly, it's fear-based. Perfectionism is often the socially acceptable form of procrastination. I remember back in college, I wasn't doing very well academically after doing pretty well academically in high school, and I found myself in academic probation. And in this class, there was a teacher that wanted to be helpful to me, and he said, hey, I think I know what your problem is. Don't we all want to know what that answer is? And he shared with me, he's like, I think you want to execute at such a high level. You have very high standards for yourself and you don't want to do a poor job. Sounds good to me. And he says, but because of that, that's what fuels your procrastination. I'd never heard that before. And it really struck me and stuck with me for a long time. I still think about that. And so when I have a moment where I'm hesitating executing on something, I ask myself, Am I paralyzed because I wanna do a great job? I don't wanna fail. I don't wanna be embarrassed or look bad. And if any of those answers are yes, I know what's actually happening. It disguises the fear of judgment, the fear of failure, and the fear of being seen as unfinished. For me, it could show up in over-editing these first few episodes, waiting for perfect timing or perfect audio. But progress is what builds confidence, not perfection. You can obsess about trying to make one thing good and really not get better at anything. There's a story that's told in James Clear's book that there's a class that had— I've heard 2 versions of it actually. There's a photography class and a pottery class. Who knows which one's the right one? I've heard it in both. But the story goes that there's a class and he divided— the teacher divided the class into 2 parts and the Half the class was instructed to take as many photographs as possible with minimal direction, or if you will, make as many pots as possible. You can guess the second half. The second half was to spend the entire semester making the perfect pot or the perfect photograph. Now, what was very interesting is you would anticipate, at least initially, that the second group was going to have the best pot or the best photo. But that wasn't the case. Instead, it was the first half of the students that took all the photos and made all the pots. Because they had all the reps and all the experience, they knew what worked and what didn't work. And through those reps, they got very, very good at being proficient and almost near perfect. But it's that pursuit of excellence that fueled that excellence. Winning is inside all of us. But it will stay inside most because of fear, worry, and doubt. Gary Vaynerchuk said he'd rather keep trying because the net score outpaces attempting perfection. He makes fun of people when he says, you want to have 3 wins and 0 losses? I'm over here trying to get 118 wins to 92 losses. Perfection is a disguise for insecurity, is what he says. So move on and keep going. That fear of failure hides behind perfectionism. How many projects die on the altar of I'm still tweaking? I've been accused before in the past of just tweaking things and going down these rabbit holes with things that don't matter. There's a big difference between intentional excellence when it's discipline-driven and destructive perfectionism, which is fear-driven. Done imperfectly today beats perfect never. In other words, If you never execute, it's not worth if you can just put something out there and fix it later. In other words, if you can get something out there and then change it over time to make it better, it's better than something that never makes it out. James Clear talks a lot about progress in his book. He says, you don't rise to your goals, you fall to the level of your systems. Now, he's not saying goals mean nothing, but he's pointing out that if you don't have systems to help you reach your goals, Then even if you write down your goals, like all the mentors and gurus say, it won't matter because you have nothing to propel you towards your goals. Greatness isn't a flawless first try. It's refined consistency over time moving towards excellence. The best performers aren't perfectionists. They're relentless refiners, constantly getting rep after rep after rep. Every podcast I record teaches me something new about storytelling, pacing, or even my audience. Lessons I couldn't have learned from theory or reading an article or a blog post. Let's face it, you can't optimize what doesn't exist. So you have to start, start with something. And you know what? Usually it's messy and that's okay, but just get it out there and start massaging it then. Iteration is what creates feedback, and then that feedback creates the mastery because you know what to fix, you know what to work on. And here's how it boils down: optimization replaces hesitation. Think about that. I'll say it again: optimization replaces hesitation. Everything can be a learning experience. It's definitely not all sunshine and rainbows, but growth seldomly is. These habits are definitely easier to avoid, and we learn through failure instead of fearing it. Growth is about not staying the same. True strength of compounding lies in its ability to magnify our efforts over time. When we maintain consistency and seize every opportunity to progress, our efforts accumulate and eventually lead farther than we ever dreamed. Consistency is the cornerstone of achieving success. Now, how do you make success seem inevitable? We talked about it earlier. Goals define what you want and systems define how you get there. So goals rely on motivation, which, let's face it, isn't always there. And systems, though, rely on structure and discipline. So don't wait for inspiration. It may never come. Trust your system. So develop one if you don't have one. Discipline can be a type of discernment to sacrifice the things that you want to do for the things that you need to do. Like we talked about last week with Jordan Peterson saying, it's important of what you attend to. So you need to be selective, sacrificing present pleasures for future benefits, setting yourself up for the best position for tomorrow. The actual actions may look different for everyone, but the sacrifice and setup principles are pretty universal. And that's what systems do. They turn action into identity. You become the person that does those things. And what's the beauty of systems? They don't care how you feel that day. You become that person. It's a very popular thing that mentors, therapists, and teachers teach people that identify that you're the type of person that fill in the blank. So for example, I'm the kind of person that doesn't smoke. I'm the kind of person that doesn't— whatever you want to do— that doesn't eat junk food, that doesn't eat sugar. Or it can be something in the affirmative. I recommend positive versions of these. I'm the kind of person that is a good husband, right? And these begin to build systems that can compound over time. This can be applied in fitness, leadership, relationships, and even faith. Remember, As we always say, daily anything changes everything. Now, next, I want to talk about comparison versus self-improvement. We're always trying to be better than our previous version of ourselves. That makes total sense. But there's a different type of comparison that's often done, especially when you're worried about executing well, being perfect, and those kinds of things. And that's comparing to someone else. You can't optimize your process while you're idolizing someone else who's honestly probably on a highlight reel. In other words, when you're comparing yourself to someone who's at their peak. So what good would it do for me to compare myself to a podcast like the Sean Ryan Show or Joe Rogan or Diary of a CEO, right? They have so much more experience, talent, and teams of people. It's unfair. They're playing a totally different game. Now, if I did that to Inspire me or show me where I could go, sure. But if I'm using it as a tool to judge where I'm not, that's where the harm comes in. It's a very common cliché that says that comparison is the thief of joy, and I really do think there's a lot of truth to that. My mentor believes in what she calls no zero days, and it's an evolution and a step up from James Clear's Never Miss Twice. Now, his concept states that streaks aren't everything. Streaks are great, but if you break your streak, if you fall, it's no big deal. Just commit yourself that you'll never miss twice. Get up, dust off, and get back into motion. That's how you handle a misstep, a relapse, or a failure. She steps that up and says no zero days. And she means that by saying you're evolving into the person that does not miss. It's a difference in identity. So that identity becomes part of you. It becomes part of your system. And this is where the difference is of self-improvement and not comparison. So we can benchmark with someone, but don't use it to put yourself down or belittle yourself. Comparison can reveal to you what's possible, but don't let it steal your peace or joy. Progress is about becoming something better than yesterday's you, but not someone else's today. Does that make sense? So if perfection kills progress, iteration fuels growth, and systems sustain success, what does it look like to live that out practically? Well, like we said earlier, shipping it. It's better to start now and come out with something and adjust as you go rather than wait for the elusive perfect moment. What if it never comes? And it, you know, honestly, it probably won't. Especially if it's your first go at something. Execution beats perfection. Get it out there. Every action, every effort brings learning and growth, and you need that to get better. To chase that perfection, you'll never achieve. Your journey to excellence isn't in the waiting. It's in the doing and evolving. So what are our key takeaways? The first is perfection isn't excellence. Progress is. We're pursuing that excellence rather than pursuing perfection, which a friend of mine said, and I really appreciated that distinction. Next is optimization doesn't mean flawless execution. Lower that expectation. I know that doesn't sound good, does it? It does mean consistent, intentional iteration. And my mentor would say daily intentional iteration. Because consistent can be daily, but daily is always consistent. So it's like a level up, right? And third is you don't need to be perfect to make an impact. You just need to move. So what if there's a message that you had that someone needed to hear, but because you wanted to make the message perfect, no one ever got to hear it? That would be a shame. I don't know what your gift is and what your talent is, But I can tell you that you can be a blessing to someone with that gift and talent. That's why we have them. So if you wait to be perfect and you never use it, that's the real travesty. It's like the America's Got Talent contestant that's 47 years old and gets on the show and is like, yeah, I mean, I'm a singer. And they're like, awesome, have you ever done this? And they're like, nope. And so you always cringe and worry that they're not really terrible, right? Because there are those too, where people just lie to them and tell them they're amazing and they're horrible. But, and then they end up being amazing, the Susan Boyles of the world, right? And so, you know, I'm glad she took that first step, but you always wonder, you know, what it would be like if she took that step earlier. The next one is momentum beats mastery every time. So get The reps, the reps are so critical at helping you learn, helping you get better. Think about it this way. One fun challenge you can do is go back and look at any famous YouTuber. So whether that's MrBeast, MKBHD, whatever, and go back to their oldest videos and you're like, holy cow, this is terrible. Alex Hormozi talks about this. He says everyone was terrible. And he goes, and with YouTube, It's all still there. And most of them leave their early stuff because it's just humorous at this point and they're comfortable with it. So it's fine. So what do we need to do this week? This week I challenge you to ship something imperfect. It's a phrase that Seth Godin says. He says, ship it, just do it. My business partner has a saying and his is fire, ready, aim. We laugh about it all the time because he just takes a shot, takes a swing, And if we need to adjust later, cool. If it wasn't the best play, awesome. We look back at it. What did we learn? How can we pivot? And then how can we use this for future moves? It's been amazing. So this week, I want you to hit publish, go live, make the call, send the message, post the video, whatever it is, even if it's messy, and share with me your win. Let me know, what did you do? How did it feel? And then how did it go? And honestly, I think this matches my higher calling. I really do think that God values progress, and he finishes what he starts. He's a great example. So remember, you don't have to rush to perfection. Just keep participating in the process, and it will take care of itself. So thanks for hanging around with me today. Next week, we're going to explore what discipline does over motivation, and how to stay consistent even when we don't feel like it. If perfectionism is the trap, then discipline can be the escape route. If this episode challenged you, share it with someone who's stuck waiting for perfect. You can find the show notes and episode recaps at optimizingbeyond.com. And remember, optimization isn't about being flawless. It's about showing up faithfully again and again. And as always, daily anything changes everything.