Science of Mind

Instead of enjoying the process, the perfectionist is always grading the results. ~~ Julie Cameron, "The Artist's Way"


Spiritualism Perfectionism

Most of us are aware of the concept of "original sin"; the belief that our inherent nature is somehow fallen or sullied from the nature of God. This belief manifests itself in myriad ways in society including the premise that our essential nature can lead us to ruin and debauchery. The bottom-line of this message is we enter the world less than perfect.

Maybe in dissent to this belief some of us have chosen to practice other religious or spiritual philosophies. One of the cornerstones of Science of Mind is the infinite inclusiveness of God, a non-dual realm of consciousness - the absolute; according to this philosophy and some others, humanity is perfect.

However, even for the most practiced, duality thinking does reoccur on occasion. We have old ideas of good/bad and right/wrong; when these judgments arise it is easy to feel as if we're failing in our spiritual practice. I refer to these feelings of failure as the result of seeking spiritual perfectionism. Julia Cameron writes, " Perfectionism (is)...the part that tells us nothing we do will ever be good enough...." How do we know when we have slipped into this mode of thinking? The simplist way is when we find ourselves trying to measure the effectiveness of our spiritual practice.