What if it's not perfect?
The trap of wanting to shine at every attempt
🏷️ Categories: Writing, Deliberate practice, Continuous improvement, Habits.
Not everything has to shine
We believe it sometimes—those of us who love writing tend to demand more of ourselves than any reader ever will. We want everything we write to be extraordinary. Every line to carry weight, every idea to be revealing. Page after page. Day after day.
And when it doesn’t happen (because it can’t always happen), we feel like we’ve failed.
We tell ourselves: “It’s not enough.” “Mediocre.” “Not worth it.”
Then comes the silence. The fear. The paralysis. The blinking cursor on a white screen and the suspicion that maybe you’re not as good as you thought… A half-finished draft and a sense of discouragement is all that remains.
—Why keep going if this doesn’t measure up? —you ask yourself.
To be honest, I’ve been there too many times. But a mindset shift changed me. You’ll see why being prolific will take you further than being perfect…
The Perfection Trap
Jerry Uelsmann, a photography professor, once conducted an experiment… On the first day of class, he divided his students into two groups:
Quantity Group
Quality Group
The quantity group would be graded on the number of photos they took. 100 decent photos would earn top marks. 50 would just be a pass. The quality group, on the other hand, only had to submit one excellent photo. That would be enough for the highest grade.
What was the result at the end of the semester?
The best photographs came from the quantity group (Bayles & Orland, 2019).
Why?
Because the quantity group spent weeks experimenting, failing, correcting, and learning. Meanwhile, the quality group got stuck in theory, in doubt, in the fear of not creating something “good enough.”
This is exactly what happens to us.
We want to make something perfect… and end up making nothing.
Repetition Before Results
Most of the time, we set ourselves monstrous goals from day one. But no, your first draft won’t be a masterpiece. And just like the photography quality group, aiming for perfection isn’t an effective way to progress.
If you want to write a great novel, don’t obsess over your first draft.
You need to write ten mediocre novels first. Or even start with several dozen short stories to figure out what works and what doesn’t. If you train with intention, every piece makes you better—and even if the result is still mediocre, you’re on the right path.
In my case, I write three articles per week. No excuses. Are they all good?
No. But some are.
And I won’t know which ones until they’re written.
From my desk, I only know one thing: if I write about fifteen articles a month, five or six will be good. Not because I say so—but because readers let me know, commenting, sharing feedback, thanking me for the good work.
And that’s the only secret: be prolific, not perfect.
It’s the same in any creative field. If you draw, don’t aim to make one perfect drawing a month. Make one drawing a day. Learn from every line. If you make music, don’t try to compose the biggest hit of your career in a month. Compose dozens, hundreds of songs. Number 67 might be the one that changes your life.
Progress doesn’t come from analysis at the starting line.
It comes from practice, and for that—you need to move.
That’s the point.
Prolific, Not Perfectionist, Mindset
There are many examples—I’ll give you just a few.
1. Isaac Asimov
He wrote over 500 books. Yes, five hundred. How many do we remember today? Just a few. The Foundation series. Some science fiction stories. Maybe an essay. But no one—no one—remembers the 400+ works that didn’t change the world.
And Asimov knew it.
He didn’t sit down expecting to write a masterpiece every day. He just sat down because it was his routine. He gave his best even when he knew that day’s work might be mediocre.
Perfection is nearly unattainable, and it’s not sustainable, work after work.
2. Lope de Vega
The "monster of nature," as Cervantes himself called him.
He wrote more than 3,000 sonnets and between 200 and 300 plays. Do we remember them all? No. But his volume was so immense that some became immortal classics of Spain’s Golden Age—a period of great cultural flourishing.
Lope de Vega was prolific by definition.
But there’s more.
3. Alexandre Dumas
He went down in history for The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers. But he also wrote hundreds of other stories—altogether totaling more than 100,000 pages. His masterpiece didn’t come out of nowhere.
It came from years of writing, writing, and more writing.
They were prolific people, examples that prove the rule: you don’t know which work will leave a mark, so treat every day like the one where you might create your masterpiece—even if the result turns out mediocre.
And here comes the hardest part…
Accepting Mediocre Work
It’s hard to accept, but it’s okay. In fact, it’s necessary.
You can’t paint something extraordinary without first making some failed canvases. You can’t write poetry that resonates without first writing verses that are just noise. You can’t write a masterpiece without first writing dozens of mediocre pieces.
The lesson?
If you want to have great ideas, you need to have (and write) a lot of ideas. Don’t worry if some of them are bad. Make space for mistakes. For the imperfect. For the forgettable. In that ocean of paper floats your best work.
Asimov said it best…
“I doubt anyone will say I’m a great writer, but I hope they’ll say: ‘Here’s a guy who really enjoyed writing.’ Many other writers I know suffer while writing—but I don’t.” (Asimov, 1985)
He went down in history as one of the greats of science fiction.
You have to love writing to be prolific—and you have to be prolific to shine.
So, are you prolific?
✍️ Your turn: What habits could you start today to become more prolific?
💭 Quote of the day: «There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.» — Maya Angelou, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings.
See you next time! 👋
References 📚
Asimov, I. (1985). Interview with Charlie Rose [Video]. YouTube.
Bayles, D., & Orland, T. (2019). Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils (and Rewards) of Artmaking.
I love this article, and it feels like you wrote it just for me. Thank you, Alvaro.
Great advice!!! And empowering as well. Thanks.