Kintsugi – the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery by mending the areas of breakage with urushi lacquer dusted or mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum

Chasing perfection

Our world is consumed by the pursuit of perfection. We strive for the ideal job, house, body, relationship, and life. While perfection isn’t inherently negative, it can be a double-edged sword.

As a homeschooled child, I often frustrated my mother by completing tasks with minimal effort. I would hand her a scribbled page with just the answers to math problems. The issue wasn’t my incorrect answers; it was my lack of working. She couldn’t award me marks for that.

You see, I could get the right answer, but the journey to that answer was invisible to her. In her eyes, the process—the messy scribbles, eraser marks, and crossed-out equations—was just as crucial as the final result. Without it, my work felt incomplete. At the time, I couldn’t comprehend why she cared so much about those chaotic intermediate steps. Wasn’t the answer sufficient? Wasn’t that simple number the perfect solution?

Reflecting on my actions now, I realize that I didn’t include the steps because it was too much effort to articulate my thought process. It was too much work to translate the mental activity into written form. Perfection seemed unattainable in my mind, so I avoided it.

As I’ve grown older and engaged in various endeavors, this struggle between completing tasks and achieving perfection has persisted. I’ve oscillated between prioritizing accuracy and efficiency. Sometimes, I focus on getting it right, while at other times, I prioritize getting it done. However, the reality is that I can’t achieve perfection in either aspect. I’m not perfect in my thoughts or actions.

One of my passions is photography. I own a Nikon Z6, along with a few native lenses (24-70, 50mm, 40mm, 70-300). The photos I can capture with it are truly stunning. Initially, I had a Nikon Z50, and one of my desires was for a smaller camera. However, I ended up getting a Z5 and then a Z6, neither of which are smaller. Despite this, the quality of photos I can achieve with the Z6 is significantly higher. I was constantly striving for perfection.

This year, I made a serious shift in my photography journey by using a camera I inherited from my grandfather—a Minolta SR3 from 1961. I purchased a few lenses that fit on it, and I’ve taken some of my favorite photos this year with it. The lenses I have are unique, and the camera itself has some issues that don’t work properly. I’m using inexpensive film with it, and there’s nothing that screams perfection. And yet, the photos I take with it bring me a sense of joy that my Z6 doesn’t.

While the Z6 undoubtedly takes better photos based on measurable metrics, it’s the imperfections in the SR3 that make me enjoy using it. There’s something liberating about embracing imperfection. With my Z6, I can shoot dozens of images, meticulously tweaking settings and framing until the photo is technically flawless (and I try). However, with the Minolta SR3, each shot feels deliberate. I have only 36 frames, no preview screen, and no way to correct mistakes after the shutter clicks. Each photo is a leap of faith.

Perhaps that’s where the joy lies—not in the perfection of the final result, but in the process of creating it. The quirks of the old lenses, the excitement of figuring out each roll of film, and the mechanical sound of the shutter—all of it feels alive. The imperfections make it authentic.

Imperfection makes things relatable. A photo that’s slightly out of focus or underexposed feels raw, like a memory—not perfectly preserved, but deeply felt. It reminds us that life is messy, unpredictable, and beautifully flawed.

When the photos finally arrive, there’s an element of surprise. Did I capture the scene correctly? Did I frame it well? Did the film itself hold up? And even when the photos aren’t perfect, they still belong to me. They tell a story not just about the scene but also about me—the choices I made and the imperfections I embraced.

Life isn’t meant to be lived flawlessly. It’s in the missed steps, the detours, and the unexpected surprises that we find the most meaning. Pursuing perfection can blind us to the beauty that’s right in front of us—the beauty of imperfection, of the process, of growth.

The reason for this is that we can’t be perfect. And often, we don’t even know what perfection is. We don’t know what we want, let alone what’s truly best.

So, while I love my Z6 and the precision it offers, it’s my SR3 that’s teaching me what it means to let go of the impossible goal of perfection. It’s showing me that imperfections aren’t something to fix; they’re something to acknowledge, work around, and even embrace. They can even be beautiful.