“I have ticked all the check boxes for that day and I have achieved all the happiness there is.”

Oh my god, that’s such a big lie that anyone would ever tell you. I mean who are these super-productive people who have these perfect days each day every single day. I want to know these people.

In my life of 30 years I haven’t met one so far; so I am doubtful if I would ever find this perfect person who gets up early morning, reads the newspaper, does their workout, reaches the workplace on time, gets everything done, returns home on time, cooks a good dinner, indulges in some light reading, meditates, does their nightly routine and goes off to sleep and don’t forget — they have a good night’s sleep as well without a sweat.

If you tell me that people have this well-oiled machine, I would like to meet them. I strive for this perfect day and it just doesn’t seem to happen. I am sure there are a few people who follow a good routine that includes a lot of what I mentioned above and can consistently do that too but if you’d tell me that these people are happy with their outcomes I shall have my doubts. 

Seven out of ten adults in the United States say they experience stress or anxiety daily and can’t sleep peacefully. Now, do I need to say more? I do! What I want to say is that a perfect day is a myth. No one has this amazing morning routine, equally amazing day at work and an amazing evening too. That’s the law of the universe. You can’t have it all.

I constantly juggle work and personal priorities. I forget to bring groceries on time; I drag myself out of bed in the morning (I am just not a morning person no matter how hard I try) I just never seem to complete everything I need to – the backlog never seems to end. So you end up feeling sluggish, tired, and disappointed. But if you look at the glass half full – then you’d tell me you had a great day – you took those tiny steps to move forward, you probably met a few people, you learned something from them, you probably had a new idea and that got you excited and that made your life a tad bit simpler. And I would call it a perfect day. It is not about meeting the standards set by someone else, but it is about ‘setting your own standards’ and ‘living by them each day’. 

So the message is simple – Don’t run behind having a perfect day, get meaning out of each day, add value to the work you do, derive satisfaction from that me-time you get and that’s what a perfect day is.