Ideas for Principle #16

💡 Finger painting - it's easier to also color a little outside the lines and then just wipe off the extra, instead of always being careful to stay exactly inside the lines.

Pouring juice into a cup - pour a bit less juice so you don't spill, and then add a bit more, drop by drop, until you reach exactly the height you want.

Cleaning a room - instead of cleaning each corner exactly right, you can clean a bit too much in one area and then finish off what's left, instead of aiming exactly right from the start.

Trying to hit the target exactly and missing every time?!
Aiming for exactly 100% is hard and takes a huge amount of time and focus.

You can think about it this way: what if we do a little less or a little more than the exact target, and fix it afterward?

Sometimes giving up on perfect precision makes the task much easier, faster, and simpler.

It also helps us day to day when we understand that not everything always has to be perfect, and the process matters just as much.
Once we understand that as part of the process we do a bit more or a bit less and then improve it one way or the other, that helps us keep going and get the action done.

We're not always perfect in our actions; we all have better days and worse days, but even then, if we know we can try, and even if we don't succeed at first, that's okay.
We'll keep trying again until we manage to do the action we wanted. That will be no less satisfying, and maybe even more so. 

Ready for a challenge? We've prepared some extra challenges for you to try

Try checking this together. Do a small task on purpose a little more or a little less than exact, then fix it, and see if that was easier than aiming exactly right.

Easy
1. Pour juice into a cup together on purpose a little less, then top it off drop by drop, and compare it to pouring exactly right from the start.
2. Ask your child when they last tried to hit something exactly and missed, and what happened.

A bit of a stretch
3. Choose a weekly savings amount together, and try saving a bit more one week and a bit less another week, and check how that feels.
4. Check together whether cleaning a room in big, imprecise areas and then finishing up is faster than precise cleaning from the start.

Challenge for champions
5. Ask your child to invent a new game that's entirely based on missing on purpose and then correcting it.
6. Try thinking together about an area of life where perfect precision actually slows things down, and plan an attempt there at doing too much or too little, and fixing it afterward.