One of my favourite reads and a book that has made the greatest impact on me is The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown. Brown is a social work graduate, researcher, and storyteller whose research focuses primarily on shame, empathy, and courage. She has spent time researching and discussing the concepts of “wholeheartedness” or “wholehearted living.” She shares that wholehearted living includes giving yourself compassion and connection and cultivating the courage to believe you are enough. With this, courage, compassion, and connection ARE the gifts of imperfection. I will attempt to convince you why you should read this book as a law student.
I read The Gifts of Imperfection in 2021 and reread it last year, and I still often think about the concepts and lessons I learned about myself through reading the book. I read it because I needed help fighting my perfectionist and comparative tendencies. If you are now or have ever been a perfectionist or like to compare yourself to others (which I am sure many law students do), then this is a great read for you.
Brown uses real-life moments and stories from her life in The Gifts of Imperfection, where she discusses a Breakdown (or “Spiritual Awakening,” as she calls it) that she endured to help her recognize she needed change. She then explores what she calls the “guideposts of wholehearted living.” There are ten guideposts that Brown canvases. These include #1: Cultivating Authenticity; #2: Cultivating Self-Compassion; #3: Cultivating a Resilient Spirit; #4: Cultivating Gratitude and Joy; #5: Cultivating Intuition and Trusting Faith; #6: Cultivating Creativity; #7: Cultivating Play and Rest; #8: Cultivating Calm and Stillness; #9: Cultivating Meaningful Work; and #10: Cultivating Laughter, Song, and Dance.
I do not want to give away a book summary, but I found some guideposts particularly compelling. For instance, the subheading for guidepost #7: Cultivating Play and Rest reads, “Letting go of Exhaustion as a Status Symbol and Productivity as Self-Worth.” Though it is formidable to work hard, our self-worth should not be tied to how productive we are or how exhausted we get from working. I think this is critical for law students to understand. Rest is important and we should set aside time to play (i.e., getting creative and doing something you enjoy) and take time for ourselves. Diving into Brown’s last guidepost, #10: Cultivating Laughter, Song, and Dance, which states, “Letting go of Being Cool and ‘Always in Control,’” means not succumbing to the embarrassment of doing what you enjoy (i.e., dancing in front of a group of people) for the sake of others’ impressions. Setting aside time to do fun things is important, so if you are stressed about doing so, know it will be beneficial in the long run.
The Gifts of Imperfection is a wonderful read for any law student (or student in general). It is hard not to strive to be perfect and get everything exactly right. The competitive and demanding culture of law school does not help but feed us this mindset. We find shame and embarrassment in making mistakes, but mistakes are intrinsically human. This book does a thorough job of explaining what it means to live wholeheartedly and how to develop our thinking to be able to do so. A beneficial lesson from this book is that comparison and perfectionism are not sustainable practices, and living wholeheartedly takes time and effort. However, this time and effort is crucial to recognize how to be compassionate with ourselves and to acknowledge when we may fall back into comparative patterns. Embracing vulnerability and recognizing when we may need to augment our self-connection is important. So, if you are reading this article and thinking The Gifts of Imperfection sounds like something you should read, I think you should. It might just make you think differently and help you realize that we are all trying our best and deserve to be a little kinder to ourselves!