Purpose over performance and the perfection paradox

Tara Turner Lockhart

2 hours ago

6 min read

On the perfection paradox, a question I loved being asked, and why the kindest thing you can do this week may be to stop and ask why.

By Author: Tara Turner Lockhart · 7 Mins Read · Autumn 2026

Not long ago, a woman I was talking with about Welltress was curious about one line in our manifesto: we choose purpose over performance. She had clearly sat with it. What message does that send, she asked, to the people we work for? To our children? Performance, after all, is how most of us were raised to measure whether we were doing well.

My first feeling was a quiet sense of being humbled. She had taken the time to truly understand what we are building here. But what I loved most was the conversation that followed. We did not settle it neatly over one cup of tea. We turned it over, the way you turn a smooth stone in your hand, and I have been turning it over ever since.

So this is my answer, or the beginning of one.

The perfection paradox

Most of us were brought up to perform. To get the grades, keep the house, remember the birthdays, answer the email before nine, look composed at the school gate, and smile through all of it. Performance was how we knew we were doing it right. It was how everyone else knew too.

I understand performance. Growing up in England, I ran cross country and ran track at the Mid Counties level, and I loved it. Running was my escape. It gave me mental relief. I always felt lighter after a run, and my head was clearer. I played county netball and on my dad's cricket team. Times, results, the next race, the next match—that was how I knew I was doing well. Later, I spent many years as director of operations in the fast-paced fashion industry, where we looked at, analyzed, and planned performance. During those years, after 9/11, I ran a marathon to raise money for the firefighters. My hometown in England rallied behind me, and together we raised over £3,000. It left me in so much pain that I could never run long distances again. It was a hard ending to something I loved.

And for a long time, performing works. Until it no longer does.

Here is the paradox I have watched in so many women and lived myself for years: the harder you try to get everything right for everyone, the less of you there is left to give. You become very good at holding it all together and quietly lose the person doing the holding. Not in one dramatic moment. One reasonable decision at a time—you might skip the walk, answer one more email first, and promise yourself you will rest when it is all done. It is never all done.

Overwhelm is what this looks like from the outside. Underneath it is something quieter. You have set yourself down, and mostly no one noticed. Including you.

I have written more about the perfection paradox and how to begin stepping out of it in its own piece: The perfection paradox.

The harder you try to get everything right for everyone, the less of you there is left to give.

What our children are watching

The part of her question that stayed with me longest was about our children. Because she is right—they are watching. Not what we tell them about rest, but whether we ever take any. Whether we speak kindly to ourselves when we get something wrong. Whether we ever stop.

I do not say this to give you one more thing to feel guilty about. One of the most generous things you can show a daughter, or a son, is you, pausing without apologizing for it. Asking why before you say yes. Treating yourself as someone worth caring for.

Performance teaches a child that worth is earned by results. Purpose teaches them they are worth something before the results come in.

That is not a lesson in doing less. It is a lesson in doing things on purpose.

What we are not saying

This is where the line is easily misread. Purpose over performance does not mean drop everything, eat bonbons on the sofa, and let the world fend for itself. The work still matters. Showing up for the people we love matters enormously. Doing something well is still the goal.

What we are saying is smaller, and I think harder. Take a moment to pause. Stop and smell the roses—I mean that quite literally; I keep a drop of rose and geranium oil close for exactly this: that deep honeyed warmth with something green and just-picked underneath. Ask yourself why you are doing what you are doing. Be present along the way, not only at the finish. And be kind to the people around you and to yourself.

I have thought about that marathon often. It asked more of me than any race I ever ran, and it was the one I ran for the clearest reason. Performance is scored by other people—the times, the results, and the applause. Purpose is kept by you. Even my running held both: the races and the results, and the escape, the lighter body, and the clearer head. Same track, two very different reasons. Purpose is not the opposite of doing things well. It is what lets you keep doing them and keep loving them long after the applause stops.

Performance asks how it looks. Purpose asks why you are doing it and whether it is still yours. The work may be exactly the same. You are not.

Becoming your own best friend

When I finally began to pause—journaling, sitting still, tending the garden the way my father taught me—I noticed something I had not expected. I came back clearer. Kinder. More of myself. I was a better friend, a better mother, and a better daughter, not because I had squeezed out more, but because there was finally someone at home to give from.

That is the heart of it. You become your own best friend first. Everyone you love benefits, but they are not the reason you deserve it. You count too, entirely on your own.

A small ritual for this evening

Before bed tonight, open a notebook and write two lines. One thing you did today because it was expected. One thing you did because it mattered to you. Judge neither. Simply notice which one left you with more of yourself.

Then close with the Ritual of Scented Breath. If you were with us at our first gathering, you will remember it. Warm a drop of oil on your wrists and palms, cup your hands over your nose, and breathe in slowly. Hold for a moment. Breathe out, and feel your shoulders soften. It is a small, gentle signal to your nervous system that you are safe and a lovely way to let the day be finished.

To the women who found us

I want to end with thanks. Since Welltress began, I have been moved beyond words by the women who have written, stopped me after an evening, sent a note, or simply turned up. Strong, smart, kind women, many of whom have spent years looking after everyone else. Your warmth has meant more than I can say. I love your questions. I love it when you see something differently or tell me what a line meant to you. No two of you came to Welltress from the same place, and that is exactly as it should be. This was never meant to be a house where everyone thinks alike. It was meant to be one where you are heard, just as you are. Conversations like the one above are exactly why this house exists—not to hand you answers, but to make room for the questions.

If you would like to keep the conversation going in person, two evenings this month feel made for it. On Tuesday, November 10, Rebecca Weinstein leads Gathering in Gratitude, an evening to pause, give thanks, and receive—yourself included. And on Monday, November 16, Leann Kelly leads Coming Home to Your Body, an evening of gentle movement, breathwork, and stillness. Both are at the Carriage Barn in New Canaan, and both are small by intention, so each gathering can hold you.

See the gatherings.

With love and intention,