‘Boarding school syndrome’ was the title of an insightful article from the UK ‘Guardian’, sent to me by my London-based sister last year. It got me thinking, or more accurately remembering things I’ve tried to erase from my memory.
So you’re at the kitchen bench and acting like a 16 year old – though you know that was half a century ago. You plonk a heavy pot almost playfully and… misjudge. Its rim heads with relentless accuracy to the one part of your foot not covered by slippers.
Perfectionism is a personality trait, wrote Mary Ellis on Kiwiboomers earlier this month.
It is not, she added, the same as striving for excellence or having high standards:
(Part one of a two part series on the plight of perfectionism)
I’m not perfect. I don’t even want to be perfect. I just want to be good. Not well-behaved good. Good as in good at. That doesn’t sound unreasonable, does it?
I decided to visit my daughter in Christchurch via the Haast and Arthur’s Passes. Not the easiest route on a bike, even with my friend (electric motor) to help me up the hills.
By the numbers…
People blink as many as 15 to 20 times a minute, far more than needed to keep our eyes lubricated. So why do we do it?
We recently set up a food rescue service at Nelson Environment Centre and called it Kai Rescue. Rescue is the operative word because since we began five weeks ago we’ve rescued 5.8 tonnes of perfectly edible food – and that’s just from two of the seven Nelson supermarkets and a couple of one-off food producers.
I have a very healthy dose of self-loathing. But I think we all have a past of being whatever our story was, of feeling not good enough. It can propel you to work harder and do more, but it can also be a tremendous trap, and you can’t see beyond it. – Kim Cattarall
Last month, working up and down the country, I heard a question voiced by several women. Their concern was, “Am I doing enough?”