What does Perfection mean to you?

Note: Do order a drink, tea, coffee or food when attending this event in support of Royal Oak for letting us use the Roxy Room. Please arrive at 6:45pm to order your drinks/food so that we can start the event at 7pm with minimum interruption. Thank you.

We admire people who are perfectionists. We use the word “perfect” to describe events that go well, athletes who are winners, students who achieve a 100% score, production lines that are highly efficient. Anything that is “flawless”.
For perfection is good and flaws….are not.
We strive for perfection; we train to be as perfect as possible. Being successful in an endeavour is achieving perfection. We do not intentionally try to be imperfect. But imperfect, we are.
To Plato, perfection represents the true essence of things; our physical world is merely the shadow of perfection which is assessable through reason and contemplation.
To Aristotle, perfection is a state of flourishing and living well which requires the development of virtues like courage, wisdom and justice and living a life of reason and activity.
Descartes’ perfection centres on establishing certainty and perfection can only come from God and not us, imperfect beings.
In our industrial and performance based culture, perfection is maximum production efficiency, in business, in beauty, in sports and all things money related.
For this event, we shall explore our obsessions with perfection, how it affects you and the un-intend consequences of this desire.

At the start of our discussion, I shall ask you what perfection means to you in less than 10 words.