Happy Friday, everyone. In last week’s note, we talked about the idea of excellence as a necessity. “Just surviving”, or any form of settling for less than excellence, does not lay a foundation for excellence, for rising in the future. It instead establishes a pattern of decline.
I really appreciate your calling out the distinction between the healthly and unhealthy quest for perfection. If the latter is perfectionism, is it fair to say that the former is what Montessori understood by her use of the word "work"? And, might the characteristics of that Montessorian notion of work what is being (re)discovered in social science as ‘grit’ or ‘growth mindset’? A dissatisfaction with the status-quo, a vision of something better, and the combination of capability, will and confidence in ones intrinsic ability to endure and progress in the pursuit of that better. Reframing perfectionism in this way has been so important in my own life, and it’s clearly one of the greatest gifts we could possibly give to our children!
I would add that it is hard and excellent work to build and maintain great friendship and romance! This excellent work Montessori speaks of is able to transcend all areas of our lives academically, emotionally, socially, spiritually, and physically. I do agree that there is work to be done on achieving this--a lifetime of work. Thank you so much for sharing this with us!
I really appreciate your calling out the distinction between the healthly and unhealthy quest for perfection. If the latter is perfectionism, is it fair to say that the former is what Montessori understood by her use of the word "work"? And, might the characteristics of that Montessorian notion of work what is being (re)discovered in social science as ‘grit’ or ‘growth mindset’? A dissatisfaction with the status-quo, a vision of something better, and the combination of capability, will and confidence in ones intrinsic ability to endure and progress in the pursuit of that better. Reframing perfectionism in this way has been so important in my own life, and it’s clearly one of the greatest gifts we could possibly give to our children!
I would add that it is hard and excellent work to build and maintain great friendship and romance! This excellent work Montessori speaks of is able to transcend all areas of our lives academically, emotionally, socially, spiritually, and physically. I do agree that there is work to be done on achieving this--a lifetime of work. Thank you so much for sharing this with us!