and now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good

and now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good

society’s obsession with morality,

Anastasia Krogh

Oct 22, 2026

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And now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.

A quote we have heard so often. A quote that has resurfaced with Netflix’s screen adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel

East of Eden

. A quote that transcends time through a constant demand of morality, a never-ending social expectation of purity.

Lately, it appears as an attack of left-wing politics. The constant online bickering of democrats having high expectations for those around them leading to more divide, more exclusion. This is nothing new, as the demand for goodness has always exceeded the demands for evil.

One wrong move and you are branded evil. A thousand good deeds and you are years away from being good. Why have we made it easier for villains to appear in masses?

While Steinbeck’s quote rings true, I refer to Toni Morrison on the reality of good:

Good is just more interesting, more complex, more demanding. Evil is silly. It may be horrible, but at the same time, it is not a compelling idea. It’s predictable, it needs a tuxedo, it needs a headline, it needs blood, it needs fingernails, it needs all that costume in order to get anybody’s attention. But the opposite, which is survival, blossoming, endurance, those things are just much more compelling intellectually, if not spiritually. And they certainly are spiritually. There’s this more fascinating job. We are already born, we are going to die, so you have to do something interesting that you respect in between.

Perhaps there is beauty in a thousand good deeds? A form of optimistic nihilism: if nothing we do matters, all that matters is that we do. The repetition is what anchors us, not the recognition.

If our life’s work is to do something interesting that we respect in between being born and being dead, then how could one deeds determine anything? How could one wrong or right move truly make all the difference? No one deed can overshadow a thousand other deeds.

And now that you can stop reaching for one perfect deed, you can accomplish a thousand good ones.

Sometimes, I think of all the traction videos and posts get on people seeing themselves as empaths, as good friends in a way no one around them is. I think that it cannot be true that a million and a half people are all exceptions.

If we are a thousand deeds, how easy for us to consider ourselves good. How easy it is for us to think we are better when we see more of our own deeds than anyone else’s. How easy it is for us to think we are better when we compare what we do to

everyone

with what others do for us, a single person.

To expect perfection would be to expect a constant, unwavering amount of good deeds. To expect goodness would be to expect a thousand good deeds, and a dozen terrible ones.

I am a thousand good deeds, and a dozen terrible ones.

I have been soft spoken and I have been sharp.

I have been kind and I have been cruel.

I have been welcoming and I have been cold.

I have been generous and I have been greedy.

I have been attentive and I have been non-communicative.

I have organised a friend’s birthday party and I have forgotten another’s.

I have sat at a hospital bed and I have left a message on read.

I have made dinner for a dozen friends and I have cancelled last minute with those same friends.

I have given excellent advice and I have given terrible advice.

I have been proud for someone else and I have been jealous.

I have attended graduations and missed weddings.

I have attended weddings and missed graduations.

I have travelled internationally and I have not seen friends in my city for months.

I have made an impact in many lives, most good, some bad.

I have not been perfect, but I have been good. And most importantly, I have been human.

Love,

Anastasia

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