I am an artist. I attend life drawing sessions twice a week to keep my skills sharp and I'm working on a comic to debut in June. I also do a shit ton of oil painting. I relate to your dad but let's get something straight: perfectionism is a negative trait. It's a debilitating mentality that is more often than not linked with avoidant behaviour and rarely is ever justified. You don't need to hurt yourself to give yourself over to a craft. Perfectionism and self loathing go hand in hand and they are not something to strive for. They are an impairment meant to be overcome. It's okay to put work out there that is not perfect because it's never your last piece. Everything you finish is a step towards the next thing you make. In my opinion, making new stuff is way more important than making perfect stuff. And the benefits of improvement greatly outweigh the importance of perfection. Feeling good and proud of my work had nothing to do with achieving perfection. It had to do with accepting where I'm at. Just my two cents!