Perfectionism in Law Firm Owners: How to Break Free and Make Progress

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Are you struggling with perfectionism in your career? In this episode of the Maximum Lawyer Podcast, Jim and Tyson discuss the damaging effects of perfectionism on law firm owners.

Perfectionism in the legal field can really hold people back in their career. It is a difficult hurdle to overcome because there are feelings of not being good enough. The constant need to be perfect can stop people from starting something new. It could be starting a new business venture, a new project or even a new relationship.

The need to have everything go a specific way with no mistakes is something a lot of people struggle with and it can really hold people back from success.

Many people get stuck in “prep mode” when having a goal to start something, due to perfectionism. For example, if someone wants to start a business in the social media field and spends months talking about the content they want to post or how they are going to market themselves, but have not taken any steps towards starting the business, no progress is ever made. Getting started is the most important thing when doing something new. So don’t fuss about the small stuff and get something on paper.

When working towards something, it is important to think about this question: What did I accomplish today? Think about the small wins and celebrate that. At the end of the day, those small wins get you closer and closer to your goal. Worrying about every small detail and wanting to make it perfect will damage any chance you have in reaching your goal. 

Jim and Tyson speak to creating pattern interrupts to help with perfectionism. Pattern interrupts involve incorporating new things in your routine as a way to move away from repetitiveness. If you do the same thing everyday, it can aid in your perfectionism. Try going for a walk in between meetings or taking a call on your front porch. It is something to break up that task and maybe trick your brain into implementing it again.

Perfectionism is a tough quality to overcome. But, with small changes and the right actions, you can break the habit in your daily life and become content with letting things be how they are!

Take a listen.

Jim's Hack: Show gratitude to people who have helped you, especially on LinkedIn. It is a good tool to keep in your backpocket.

Tyson's Tip: Try out a cold plunge as it has many benefits such as boosting energy.

Episode Highlights:

• 2:53 Jim and Tyson discuss how perfectionism holds law firm owners back.
• 5:24 Jim and Tyson share their own struggles with perfectionism.
• 13:20 Importance of celebrating small wins.
• 14:32 The importance of taking action.
• 16:15 The value of incorporating pattern interrupts into routines.

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Resources:

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Transcripts: Perfectionism in Law Firm Owners: How to Break Free and Make Progress

Jim Hacking:
Welcome back to the Maximum Warrior Podcast. I'm Jim Hacking.

Tyson:
And I'm Tyson Mewtrix, what's up Jimbo!

Jim Hacking:
Oh Tyson, it's good to be back. We haven't recorded in a while. I just noticed that our episode with John Day was released and I was like, man, we just recorded that. So I know that means that we don't have many in the can. I know we have a full day of recording today so I'm excited to spend the day with you.

Tyson:
Yeah, it usually means one of two things, either it was bumped up, which sometimes we do, we bump them up, or we have very few in the can, which is, it sounds like that's where we are.

Jim Hacking:
Could be both, because it was a great episode, and it's summertime, so sometimes the bounty runs a little low.

Tyson:
That's very true, very true. What you up to these days? How you doing?

Jim Hacking:
Well, I'm looking at, so one of my YouTube subscribers sent me a bag of Dungeons and Dragon dice. I'm very excited about it. I can do the sound if you wanna hear it. And you might say to yourself, Jim, why do you have, why?

Tyson:
Yes, that's exactly what I want to know. Why do you have Dungeons and Dragons dice?

Jim Hacking:
I made a comment on the show, on my live show a couple weeks ago about how I really wish I had a 20-sided die because people call me up on the show and they have some cockamamie immigration plan that's really, really dumb. And I say to them, well, you have a 5% chance of this going really, really badly, or you have a 10% chance of this going really, really badly. So I wanted to have dice to represent to say, okay, let's play a game. you're gonna throw out a number, I'm gonna roll the dice, and if you hit, that means you're getting deported, or you're gonna be stuck outside the United States. And that scares the shit out of people. They're like, no man, don't throw that die, don't throw that, I don't wanna see that. So somebody just, they didn't identify who they were, but they said, here are the dice for you.

Tyson:
I like it. Well, you know what? Now we're going to do a little show and tell. So Stephen McClellan sent me this cool little thing. Check

Jim Hacking:
He's

Tyson:
this

Jim Hacking:
a good

Tyson:
out.

Jim Hacking:
dude.

Tyson:
So

Jim Hacking:
He's a good dude.

Tyson:
for those of you

Jim Hacking:
Oh

Tyson:
that can actually

Jim Hacking:
nice

Tyson:
see, this is a piece of the airplane of the Spirit of St. Louis. He's a pilot, I'm a pilot, and it's really cool. So there's a little description. For the wings, they used to use fabric. right, not aluminum. And so it's a piece of the fabric from the plane, which is pretty cool. So

Jim Hacking:
That's awesome.

Tyson:
yes, thank you, Steven. Really appreciate it. That's awesome. But all right, let's get, I wanna make sure we don't have time for our topic today because I think it's a good one. Do you wanna introduce the topic?

Jim Hacking:
Today I want to talk about perfectionism. And you know, as of the time of this recording, we have about 200 law firm owners in the Guild. Obviously we have thousands of other law firm owners in the big group and who listen to the podcast. And I have to say that one of the things that I see really holding people back is perfectionism. And I would define perfectionism as sort of an overarching. debilitating fear to get started because you're not going to be able to do it perfectly or Exactly right forever and I think it really is a hurdle for a lot of people and I thought it would make an interesting Topic for our show today

Tyson:
I think it's a beautiful topic and it's funny. Sometimes these topics, they track, actually I would say not sometimes, usually the topics track what's going on in our lives. And I think this is an interesting one because both of us, Jason Selk is coaching both of us right now. And perfectionism is one of those things that he talks about quite a bit because… That PCT is very, very bad. And I would agree with you. And it's, I would say that the perfectionism is many times the things that, that stops people from launching and launching, not just meaning the firm, but launching anything, any idea that they have, um, any, any special project, hiring people, starting their firm, you name it, they want everything to be lined up just right. And the reality is that that's not the right way of going about things. But it's a massive block, wouldn't you say? Like, would you say that's the number one block for people? I don't know if I would say number one, but would you?

Jim Hacking:
I'm a little biased because I'm a ten-quick start. So I sort of speed through those kinds of things, and so I might not be the most accurate judge of that. But yes, I think it's certainly one of the top three things that hold law firm owners back, that fear of getting started versus just jumping right in. And I'm glad that you mentioned that half the time the things that we talk about, or even more so, half the times we think of, we talk about issues on this show that are things that we've either struggled with or are currently struggling with. So I guess we should begin by talking about our own journeys with perfectionism. How has it manifested for you? And then I can share sort of what I've struggled with in my own weird way of perfectionism.

Tyson:
That's an interesting question. I didn't know you were going to ask me that, but I'm glad you did. I think the way that probably early on, the way it manifested the most is just probably beating myself up too much over things that I should have been really happy about. And instead, I picked on the small things. And that is one of those symptoms of that perfectionism where you'll do something really, really well. And let's just use… We'll go with the baseball season. Let's go with a baseball analogy. Let's say that you have an amazing game and you, let's say you were three for four, right? And you had, let's say a triple, a double and a single, like, oh, and, and you did great in the field, but on that one at bat, you struck out like at the end of the day, you focus and I will say, I was really bad about this whenever I was, when I played baseball growing up where I'd have an amazing game. and I would talk about that one thing that happened. And so I would say that that's probably where it manifested the most. And that's not just in baseball, but throughout my life, that's probably where it's manifested the most is when it comes to perfectionism. What about you?

Jim Hacking:
So for me, this isn't gonna surprise you, because you know how I run in streaks, and I'll have a great streak going, I'll be doing everything right the way that I wanna do it, and then I'll have one bad day, and then I'm like, fuck it, I wanna stop, I'm never gonna do that again, right? That's really how perfectionism holds me back, is that if I, the goal of perfectionism defeats the satisfaction. of getting the wins, the small wins. I mean, I remember when I read in Relentless Solution Focus where there was a hockey player who was struggling with drinking and Jason said to him, well, why don't you just drink one night a week? And I was like, one night a week? Well, that'll break his streak. Then that'll be bad. And so yeah, this is something that really I've struggled with and still struggle with.

Tyson:
Yeah, and it's funny about you. Like you'll be very passionate about something one way or the other. And I'll just, let's just wait a week. Let's just wait a week. We'll see what we'll see how Jim feel next week. And if Jim feels the same way in a week. All right. Well then, uh, then he's really committed to whatever that thing is. Um, but

Jim Hacking:
So

Tyson:
no,

Jim Hacking:
let's talk about,

Tyson:
yeah.

Jim Hacking:
oh, go ahead.

Tyson:
I know, but I was going to say you're right about it, but like, um, I think it's also important. that there are so many people that preach, there's always like one way. But what you just said is really important about, like there's no like one way, like you go in streaks, some people don't, like there's no one way. So we're gonna talk about it a little bit, but just because we're saying one thing doesn't mean it's the way.

Jim Hacking:
Well, let's talk about something much more fun than how we've struggled with perfectionism. That is how we see others struggling with perfectionism, because it's so much easier to talk about them over there versus us. But I mean, I was talking to a friend yesterday who wants to get into a consulting business and wants to start doing some social media. And you know, she wants it to be perfect. She wants it to be top notch. She wants it to be high quality. And those are all good things. Those are all good things unless six months later, you're still talking about that and haven't created some damn content. So I think that's the real test is that if you've thought about doing a change or doing something new and you're in prep mode for that for a really, really long time, you know, like the classic story of the law firm owner who can't announce their new firm venture unless they have. best logo that's ever been designed, right, or the best trade name for their law firm. So

Tyson:
Just such

Jim Hacking:
it,

Tyson:
a waste of time.

Jim Hacking:
yeah,

Tyson:
Such a waste of time.

Jim Hacking:
yeah. So it's just, it's, it's sort of not realizing what the most important thing is, which is just getting started. You know, a good example, you know, I have a, I have a YouTube live show with lots of people watching now, and I, I talk for an hour about immigration and If you go back and look at my old videos, they're just so boring and so, hi, I'm Jim. I'm an immigration lawyer. Today, let's talk about citizenship. I mean, it could be no more boring. So you've got to get started so that you can get better.

Tyson:
Yeah, and it's really about making that progress. And so if you kind of just step back and think about the way you should really view your day is, okay, did I make progress today? Did I move the ball forward? Okay, and if you did, you need to celebrate that. It's interesting. So we'll do these accountability calls in the guild and people will see the things that they're gonna do on Monday and then Friday, they'll come to the Friday call and they'll do all these amazing things, right? And then they'll be like, but I didn't get it all done. So I'll give myself a five out of 10. Well, like, hold on a second. Like, did you put in… a good amount of effort towards moving the ball forward. And like sometimes they'll put like five, six hours into the thing, whatever the thing is and they'll have made a bunch of progress, but then they'll beat themselves up because they didn't get it done. And the reality is, is you're not going to get things done every week and every single day. It's something that it takes time. Like some of these projects that we're doing as firm owners, they take several months, right? current project, it won't get done until the end of September probably. And if you really step back and the whole project is taken, it's really a two and a half year project that we've been working on. But it's something that we're working on regularly and it's bit by bit by bit and we're always making progress on it. But really, it just, it eats me up whenever I see these law firm owners, they're beating themselves up whenever they're making a ton of progress, but then they're just… they're just down on themselves because they didn't finish the thing, whatever the thing is. And that's just a really negative way of viewing things.

Jim Hacking:
I think another form of perfection is when law firm owners says to themselves, well, everything has to be perfect before I do this, especially hiring, right? Everything I have to have, all this money in the bank account before I do that. If you find yourself using language like that, like the stars have to align or I won't be able to take action. I mean, that to me is really where I see it manifesting itself a lot is that… Maybe it's a safety thing, maybe it's a fear thing, maybe it's I don't wanna go out on a limb, but I hate to tell you, part of running a law firm is the uncertainty of outcome. And if you are really, really being limited by that, then maybe you wanna have a job and not so much be running a law firm, because running a law firm is a risk entailing venture.

Tyson:
Yeah, another one of those is I got to have all the video equipment. I've got to have all the right video equipment before I start doing videos. And I've got to have all my scripts written. I've got to have all my topics. I've got to have all the best lighting. But in reality, Jim, what is your most valuable piece of video equipment?

Jim Hacking:
Probably this microphone and that camera.

Tyson:
Okay, not expensive, most valuable. What's the one you use the most often?

Jim Hacking:
Oh,

Tyson:
It's

Jim Hacking:
my phone.

Tyson:
your phone, that's right.

Jim Hacking:
Yeah.

Tyson:
It's your phone. Actually, right now I'm recording this episode, the camera is my phone camera. That's what I'm using, camo, that's what I'm using. And the video is amazing on it. And we overlook those things sometimes. I think a good lesson is to look for the simplicity. look for the simplicity in things as opposed to trying to make things so complicated. And if you can find that simplicity, it's going to really help you combat that perfectionism.

Jim Hacking:
you're listening to the Maximum Aware podcast. Our guest today is that MFer Perfection, and we're kicking MFer Perfection to the curb. Tyson, I wanna shift gears a little bit and talk about sort of how we break through perfectionism, sort of what are some tips that we can give to our listeners about how to move past perfectionism.

Tyson:
Um, yeah, uh, the, I would say the number one thing, I think maybe the number one thing is celebrating your wins is maybe the number one, even, even if they're small, just finding a win. Um, even if you say at the end of the day, oh my gosh, I didn't do anything to it. No, you did something. Like you did something. You, you, you did something to move the ball forward and celebrating those,

Jim Hacking:
Why

Tyson:
those things.

Jim Hacking:
is that important?

Tyson:
And It's going to change the way you view things quite a bit. And it's going to make you appreciate the small progress that you make on a regular basis. And it's going to allow you to realize how you're watching things progress. You're actually seeing things. If you're taking that self-assessment, you're watching in real time as the ball is moving forward, how you're making progress inch by inch by inch. on whatever that project is, whatever that thing is you're doing, you're actually able to stop in the middle of all the chaos of your life and say, oh my, you know what? I am actually making progress on that. And it's going to give you that boost of confidence that you really need because confidence is really the number one factor that you should be looking for is that confidence. If you can boost that confidence, everything else will sort of fall into place.

Jim Hacking:
For me, when I find myself slipping into perfectionist tendencies, one of the things that really helps is just to take some action. To do one little step, to do one thing. What can I do today or in the next 25 minutes or this hour? Not putting it off till tomorrow. Giving myself some wiggle room. I think sometimes I've really seen people, and I've gone through this myself, where you get sort of, I always view it as a box. inside of sand. Like you're in a, somebody has dug a box of sand in the sand for you and you're sort of trapped down in it and you gotta sort of start to wiggle free and you gotta sort of um, I think I've told you before about when my dad, we were canoeing down the Black River when I was a kid and my dad got caught in some quicksand and he started to sink and my dad was a man of quick action and hot temper and so he wanted to just sort of like go crazy and get out, but what he did was he just stopped moving and he found himself floating to the top. So I think about that when it comes to being stuck in that sand mass of perfectionism is that you've got to do something to just change it. Maybe it's go for a run or go to the spa or just do something to give yourself some freedom and some, a little bit of movement so that you can get out of that box and then move towards where you want to be.

Tyson:
You know, as much of a routine guy as I am, I love the idea of pattern interrupt where you've got your routine, but then you say, you know what? I'm changing things up today. I'm gonna stop doing this thing and I'm gonna go out and. Like you said, you'll go for a walk, go for a run. Maybe I might take this meeting outside and we're gonna go on a walk. That the whole pattern interrupt can be very, very valuable. I think that's a whole episode for another day, but

Jim Hacking:
It probably

Tyson:
I think

Jim Hacking:
is,

Tyson:
that that'd

Jim Hacking:
it probably

Tyson:
be

Jim Hacking:
is

Tyson:
good.

Jim Hacking:
because the very first thing my therapist had me do when I started seeing her years ago was to brush my teeth with my left hand. That was the very first thing, the very first homework assignment that I got was to brush my teeth with my left hand. And I think you're right. I mean, on Wednesdays, you know, I get up every morning at 420 to go to the gym to work out at 5. On Wednesdays, I really go out on the edge and I say, you can sleep as long as you want on Wednesdays and Sundays. Now nine times out of ten I get up somewhere between 4.30 and 5, but I have been known to sleep longer and I think you have to build in those pattern interrupts to try to break up that routine and that monotony.

Tyson:
As a quick timeout, what was the purpose of brushing your teeth with your left hand?

Jim Hacking:
Oh, I mean, first of all, it triggers different synapses in your brain. But I think more so it was just to see things from a different point of view. I mean, try it. Try it tomorrow. I mean, when you do it, you're just like, well, or you're left handed, aren't you?

Tyson:
I'm right here.

Jim Hacking:
Yeah. So try it with your left hand. Just see what just it just feels weird. It feels it feels a little different. And it was about she knew that, I mean, back then, I was in a lot of pain and a lot of discomfort and she knew that. She wanted to push those buttons to try to see what shifts could be made.

Tyson:
I actually, I can't wait to do this. You know what I mean? I'm, I'm into experimenting.

Jim Hacking:
You can do

Tyson:
So

Jim Hacking:
it in your

Tyson:
that's.

Jim Hacking:
you can do it in your ice freezer speaking of

Tyson:
Yes,

Jim Hacking:
pattern interrupts.

Tyson:
I'm going to get to

Jim Hacking:
Oh

Tyson:
my tip later. That's

Jim Hacking:
All right

Tyson:
going to be my tip of the week. So very good. All right, any final words on this, Jimbo?

Jim Hacking:
Well, as always, as always, be easy on yourself. Don't beat yourself up. You don't need to listen to this episode and say to yourself, God damn it, I am a perfectionist, and then use that to keep yourself from taking action. So as with all things, a little progress is good. Just do what you can. Try to move the needle a little bit. If you need help, reach out in the big group. join the guild, talk to us, reach out to Tyson and I. I mean, I was talking to a member yesterday who's struggling. It's not easy running a law firm. It's one of the hardest things you'll do besides raising kids. And I was thinking the other day, we could do an episode on how running a law firm is like raising kids. But in general, I just want you to be your best, to free yourself from whatever's. holding you back. That's why Tyson and I started this podcast in the first place. Why we started the Facebook group, why we started the guild so that people would have resources and a place to go that's optimistic, forward looking, wanting to improve, sort of drowning out the negative. And I really believe that with all the negativity that's going around, you need to surround yourself with people who don't. subscribed to that who don't give into that. The election cycle is heating back up again and I find myself getting drawn back to Twitter. And I just got to remember that stuff is just noise and it keeps you from, it keeps me and you from moving forward.

Tyson:
100% well said it's not Twitter anymore. It's X. X

Jim Hacking:
Oh yeah, you've

Tyson:
is

Jim Hacking:
been big

Tyson:
the

Jim Hacking:
on that,

Tyson:
new.

Jim Hacking:
yes.

Tyson:
Yeah, it's posts now It's not tweets. It's posts. But alright Jimbo. Let's wrap things up speaking of hanging out with Positive people if you want to join us in the big Facebook group join us there if you will and it's just If you're not in the Facebook group, you're listening to this, I think you're missing out on a ton of valuable content. If you want a more high-level conversation with more curated content, go to maxlawguild.com. We'd love to have you there. And if you get something from this podcast, we'd love for you to give us a five-star review and help us share the love. It helps spread the word to other law firm owners just like you. Jimmy, what's your hack of the week?

Jim Hacking:
In the last few weeks on LinkedIn and Facebook, I have seen people make posts where they sort of talk about things they're thankful for and they tag people that have sort of guided them. We received one of those this morning. Somebody left us a nice review and it wasn't somebody that we even know or that we've ever heard of. And Joey Vitali is really good at this about, you know, sort of these gratitude posts where you tag people. I think it could be annoying and overused, but I think it's a great way to get engagement and to sort of thank the people that have helped you. And I've written those posts. I think it's a good tool to keep in your toolbox. Again, don't abuse it, but I think it's something that can really sort of amplify the kinds of things we were just talking about on the episode, which is that positivity and the gratitude.

Tyson:
Yeah, I like that one. I think anytime you can thank someone for helping you get to where you are, I think that it's a very good thing. My tip of the week, you sort of hinted at it actually. So I've been wanting to do cold plunges for a while and it was funny. So Amy and I, we went out, I went to buy like one of those big tubs to do it in. And she was like, well, she's like, why are we doing this? Like, I've been watching all these videos online. where these people are taking chest freezers and doing it. I said, what? And I was a little resistant at first. She's like, yeah, she's like a lot of it. So we pulled up some videos and I saw some people how they're doing it. And so I put together a chest freezer cold plunge and it's really simple. You take, you have a water filter, you have a chest freezer that I got for 175 bucks on Facebook, cleaned it out. And then I got this ink bird that it's a little plug that goes into the wall. And then this temperature probe goes into the freezer and it, once it gets to the, to the optimal temperature that you set it at, you, it shuts off, right? So it shuts off the electricity to it. So it doesn't get any colder. Uh, and it's really cool. So, and the way the chest freezer is, is it, it will stay at that same temperature for days if you keep the lid closed. It's, it's incredible how long it will stay at that same temperature. So the amount of time that it's actually on, it's very, very minimal, but, um, I did it, I did it this morning. It's the feeling, I'm not even gonna list all the benefits that you get from doing a cold plunge, but you should just Google it. It's quite amazing. The high that you get from it, from the dopamine, it's a sustained high. It's not one of those things where it's like temporary. It actually lasts throughout the day. It's really, really cool. So I highly recommend it. If you thought about it, you don't have to do a deep freeze one, but it's the do a cold plunge if you've not done it before. Really recommend it.

Jim Hacking:
What temperature do you keep the water at?

Tyson:
So mine's at, I've got it down to, I started it in the high 50s. I'm now at 55 and it, 55 may not seem like it's like, to some people, whenever I heard the temperatures, like that doesn't sound very cold. When you're in it, it's freaking, it's freaking cold. So my goal is to get it down to 50 is my goal.

Jim Hacking:
And how long do you stay

Tyson:
About halfway

Jim Hacking:
in?

Tyson:
there.

Jim Hacking:
How long do you stay in?

Tyson:
See you again.

Jim Hacking:
How long do you stay in?

Tyson:
All right, so I'm up to three minutes. All right, I started at one minute and then now I'm up to three minutes. I think I'll probably end up getting to the point where I'll be done around 10 minutes, but the real point is where you should stop is where you start to shiver because if you start to shiver the benefits, you've now achieved all the benefits that you're going to get out of it. So it doesn't matter if it's 30 seconds or two minutes or whatever. when you start to shiver is whenever you should start to get out because then that's where the benefits start to… There's no more returns on your body and staying in there if you stay in longer than when you start shivering. So that's really when you should stop. Have you done one ever?

Jim Hacking:
Yeah, yeah, I've gone to those cryo places.

Tyson:
Okay, gotcha.

Jim Hacking:
And when I read the Jim Quick book, I did some cold showers for a while, but I sort of moved on from that.

Tyson:
Yeah, well, and with that, there is some research that says that a cold shower is going to give you just as much of a benefit as a cold plunge. So if you're wanting to just do cold showers, you can do it, but I can tell you, I've done cold showers, we did cold showers because of 75 hard, because the different phases we went through, I can tell you it's not even comparable. the energy you get from the cold plunge versus the cold shower a lot better. All right, man. Good talk to you. I'll talk to you more later.

Jim Hacking:
All right, buddy. See ya.