The Perfect Limit

By Leah

“You're the only person that has to like you. Which is empowering and scary.”

Leah: What I learned from my mom, dealing with perfection, high internal standards that you set for yourself.

Mom: I was born in Moscow, Russia, 1969.

Leah: That there's no such thing as perfection when it comes to health and body image.

Mom: Balanced diet and exercise. So, the most important thing, how you feel. If you feel healthy, if you feel energetic, and you'll like yourself.

Leah: You like yourself.

You're the only person that has to like you. Which is empowering, and scary. She showed me that even though she might've preferred one thing over the other, I was still free to carve my own path and that nothing is ever...

Mom: Just black-and-white.

Leah: Next, my mom is talking about training for competitive cross-country skiing with my grandfather, her dad.

Mom: I liked cross-country skiing, but I would be exhausted by the end of day, and then couldn't like pretty much move my legs anymore. And he will look at me and said, “no, you can, you can just go one more hour.” And then he would like, push me to do those routes and push me and push me. I didn't want to push you to the point of, like, not to like what you would be doing. You see? You know, my kids don't want to be ballerina like I wanted. I tried to make ballerina out of you because that's what I wanted to be, all my childhood. And you didn't want it, and it took me a while to accept that.

Leah: Hockey, martial arts, so it's like similar enough to ballet.

I felt empowered and free to express myself.

I would actualize the paths I would eventually go down, and I grew up with an appreciation for what my parents weren't fortunate enough to grow up with, like...

Mom: American democracy is just the blessing comparing with… communism, socialism, or whatever other, like the, competitor regime. I was growing up in Russia, nobody really express ideas freely because everybody was afraid of each other, nobody trusted each other.

Leah: And on mindset...

Mom: Intensity? Yes, it helps you to achieve. I think I pretty much, like, achieved a lot for what I wanted it and now I'm just trying to enjoy myself and find enjoyment in everything. And I don't find enjoyment in pretty much my environment and surroundings as in my wonderful children.

What was the question again?

Leah: [laughs] What was the question.

Mom: You have to know who you are. You cannot deny your weak parts and your strong parts.