District Assessment

Authors note: This was my Spring district assessment, and although I am not particularly proud of this since as we all know they do not give you the greatest topic to base your response from, but I put it on here anyways and feedback would be nice.

If you win for so long you’re bound to face defeat.  It’s necessary because without ever loosing you will never feel what it truly is to win.  Some of us are scared by our misfortunes and loses, but the way to lose is not by being less fortunate than others, but by our own imperfections and traits.  Although we must take into account the definition of perfect. Doesn’t perfect vary from each person perspective? Therefore no one could fit the ideal perfect state of being, but everyone has a sense of perfection in their mind that most strive to fulfill. The strife for perfection alters a person causing them to perform and do such tasks that may hurt others.

Loyalty and perfection are associated with each other to some extent, but when you begin to do tasks that you under other circumstances wouldn't perform it perfection is what keeps you doing it.  There are many people who suffer from OCD (Obsessive- Compulsion Disorder). It’s a anxiety disorder that causes obsessive behaviors and thoughts, and many of who have this disorder are said to be perfectionists.

In the short story The Hundredth Dove, by Jane Yolen the main character, Hugh, is a fowler who seems to have many signs of being a perfectionist. Each day he would set off to the forest and accomplish the same tasks daily: preparing his net and vanished the miniscule blemishes from the silk material.  Then stretching it and capturing twenty plump gray doves, and brought them back through the same path. This routine that could have triggered an already acquired OCD trait. The king told Hugh to bring him one-hundred doves for his wedding. This task didn’t seem too grand to Hugh, and once again he walked through the forest to his accustomed spot, and achieved his usual task. For five days did the same routine. Over and again.  The fact that all he ever did was the same exact thing every day and caught the same amount of doves each day is what makes me believe Hugh has obsessive-compulsion disorder, and on the final day he killed the white dove to achieve his task of one hundred doves.

To succeed in his task he became almost insane. His strife for perfection was so overwhelming he began doing task most would never do. Perfection and anxiety alter yourself and yourself beliefs. Don’t let perfection control your life and consume it.