Perfection

One of my earliest and longest held beliefs is that some people are closer to perfection.

Riding in the back seat of the car on one of those glorious California days that I first voiced my suspicion.  During a moment of silence, I said to my mother who was driving, “I think there are still people that are closer to perfection than others.” She calmly asked me why I thought that. After I gave my 6-year-old explanation she quietly took her eyes off the road, turned and said, “Don’t ever tell anyone you think that outside of your family.”

Perfect, “to bring to full development, finish or complete so as to leave nothing wanting.” Perfect just means complete. The Idea that no one is perfect has always seemed foolish to me. If there are imperfect people of course there are people that are perfect. There are those that are completed. Righteousness is to seek to perfect oneself. There are people that are the ideal form and function of our species. Some of those people were born closer to perfection either via luck but usually by careful planning by their parents and ancestors. Then, there are those people that understand that they can become perfect. To me the pursuit of perfection in oneself is the meaning of life and is a credit to ones, family, ancestors and humanity.  The pursuit of perfection was downgraded as it didn’t appeal to the masses, it was deemed unnecessary and unrealistic. A foolish aspiration and regard for oneself.

Lucy Hughes-Hallet included this quote in her book, Cleopatra. “Nietzsche described two ways of coming to terms with the inevitability of death. The way of Apollo is through the exaltation of the individual, through order and beauty. The Apollonian man achieves serenity by discipline and refinement of the self; he cultivates those aspects of his personality which are least carnal, least obviously a part of a dying animal which is his body. Thus, he separates himself from the rest of biological life and transcends his wretchedness. The Dionysiac way leads the opposite direction. It is the way to self-abandonment.” The idea that you are more wholesome and “real” for not seeking or requiring perfection is misguided. To require to be accepted flaws and all is to say you abandoned yourself and have retired to the ease of existing at the level that requires the minimal level of skill, intestinal fortitude and physical exertion required for one to meet their basic needs for pleasure, survival and a good life.

Perfectionism is any moral view centered on those which value human excellence. Perfectionism identifies things essential to humans, things we already think most worth developing. There is a standard for perfection. Physical courage, physical strength, endurance, good health, correction of any mental or emotional weaknesses and countermeasure unscrupulous teachers/leaders. Of course, perfect one’s body to optimize its form and function. You are blessed with a life and physical body, take care of it and all its parts. Perfection is to leave self-indulgent, light minded and carnal recreations the things that lead people to want something that is not good for them and therefore aren’t good for the larger social group as well. All human behavior should be directed to one goal, developing the properties that are essential to becoming a complete person. Every person should be committed to developing themselves and their nature to the highest degree.

The highest form of pleasure is the awareness of an increase in ones perfection. The human desire for pleasure is great which should suggest that we desire perfection but often substitute hedonistic pleasure with the tendency to perfection. We can have it all, pleasure is in the pursuit of perfection. Subverting perfection and regarding it as unobtainable and unrealistic is an example of the obstacles to perfection that Nietzsche illustrates, “the law of absurdity in the whole economy of mankind,” the conditions for the success of the well-constituted are more complicated and supplied less. I think the complication and hardship is due to perfection not being valued or regarded as a worthwhile endeavor. Nietzsche does not believe a perfect life is also pleasant, he believed suffering, and even great suffering, is needed for real achievement. I disagree with this as suffering is largely meaningless. Suffering is either something that is put upon someone or is born out of misdirection and poor self-regard. When we do suffer, we can work to remedy our injury and weakness and continue the path to perfection. According to Nietzsche, hurdles to achieving perfection can be external and internal as a person can have an anti-perfectionist propensity described as “inner hopelessness.”

Nietzsche believed people need self-discipline and firmness toward themselves, to control impulses that deter them from perfection; as demonstrated in his slave-revolt in morality, he demonstrates that people will choose lesser forms of will and lesser value for themselves and others. He describes decadence as a state in which “the will to power is lacking” and an individual “prefers what is disadvantageous to itself.” This preference is not only harmful to the individual but also to society. He also describes higher and lower forms of power, Nietzsche thinks some people prefer lower forms, like resenting others rather than developing their own capability. There is a reason why envy is one if the seven deadly sins, it is lazy and undermines cultivation of one’s capacities for good. We find out who and what we are when we find our highest and best form. We have all seen a rose or some other thing whose essence can be fully seen as its form is complete, it is a perfect presentation of what it is.

There is more power in having a structured goal that is complex to achieve as that achievement accentuates a complex dynamic between its parts. If you chose to attach yourself to the pursuit of things that are deemed complex and too difficult to achieve you will develop a preference for other goals that confer higher forms of power. A commitment to a complex goal is an exercise of power. If obtaining completeness/perfection is difficult it is a test of ones power and will, it is a great opportunity to exercise both. An easy example of this would be a commitment to physical fitness/body building etc. One good habit leads to another, commitment to good things builds a sustained preference for more good things. The consequences of perfection maximize the idea that the right action is the one that yields the best possible outcomes. An action is right because it has good outcomes as a constituent.

Schopenhauer said “‘Mankind must work continually at the production of individual great men, that and nothing else is its task.” We can adopt that view and apply it ourselves and decide, what is our meaning and highest justification and then work continuously toward our meaning and justification.  You must be indifferent to what others do if it is not good and is outside the bounds of your meaning.

Restraining the pursuit of personal perfection to then acknowledge the similar perfection of others is the hallmark of the current culture, where people will scroll a curated timeline on social media that is largely informing one of what they desire for themselves without them ever working toward obtaining it, whilst also lamenting that it is unobtainable and unrealistic. Perfectionism is distinctly a moral view that perfection in the best individuals promotes far reaching outcomes and when integrated by everyone compounds these outcomes that are largely good. Perfectionist value theory seeks to demonstrate the things people should preserve, promote and engage with. Some ways of living are not valuable, even if they are fully embraced. Perfectionism in contrast to hedonism does not promote that everything that feels good is also good for you or society. Compared to hedonism all things that are good for people and society are not comprised of pleasurable sensations or attitudes.

Derek Parfit characterizes perfection as “the best things in life and the pursuit of them.” Perfection is a persistence of will, what some call grit. It is the pursuit of the highest quality of spiritual, mental, physical and material well-being. We should care about our own perfection as well as the perfection of others. The pursuit of perfection promotes objectively good lives. The Ego is important in the pursuit of perfection as a healthy and intact Ego should drive one to perfect themselves. We have an obligation to perfect ourselves and we should care about and be interested in the perfection of others. We should be preserving and creating the best possible experiences, some of these things may not be desired to be fulfilled but must be out of duty and an abundance of self-respect. The pursuit of perfection will require rigorous hard work, self-restraint and sacrifice without compromise. Even if you fail by some measure, perfection. Even if you fail by some measure, perfection and completeness can be found in the pursuit.