Many years ago, when I first met my now husband, in the course of conversation I said that I'd been a 'good enough' mother to my children.  
'That's not very good', he responded.    
Aah, 'but it's good enough', I replied.

Perhaps that's exactly what we should aspire to, not what society leads us to expect of ourselves.

Blog The Daily Beast says:
... rather than leaping with glee at the liberation that has befallen women since the 1960s, we are laboring instead under a double whammy of impossible expectations—the old-fashioned ones (to be good mothers and wives, impeccable housekeepers and blushing brides) and those wrought more recently (to be athletic, strong, sexually versatile, and wholly independent). The result? We have become a generation desperate to be perfect wives, mothers, and professionals—Tiger Moms who prepare organic quinoa each evening after waltzing home from the IPO in our Manolo Blahnik heels. 

Even worse, we somehow believe that we need to do all of this at once, and without any help. Almost by definition, a woman cannot work a 60-hour-per-week job and be the same kind of parent she would have been without the 60-hour-per-week job. No man can do this; no human can do this. Yet women are repeatedly berating themselves for failing at this kind of balancing act, and (quietly, invidiously) berating others when something inevitably slips. 

Think of the schadenfreude that erupts every time a high-profile woman hits a bump in either her career or her family life. Poor Condoleezza Rice, left without a boyfriend. Sloppy Hillary, whose hair is wrong again. Bad Marissa Mayer, who dared to announce her pregnancy the same week she was named CEO of Yahoo. She could not pull it off (snicker, snicker). She paid for her success. She Could. Not. Do. It. All. ...

And there's more on this at: http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/09/23/why-women-should-stop-trying-to-be-perfect.html

Another interesting site is: http://www.alreadypretty.com/2010/08/repost-reality-check.html.

And here's an angle from Time Magazine (http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1733856,00.html): 
... Five years ago, Dr. Alice Domar, a successful psychologist in Boston, had what she describes as an "ah-ha experience." A new patient, whom she refers to as "Kim," came in for an evaluation. Kim seemed to have everything — a happy marriage, four well-adjusted kids, a well-to-do lifestyle, good health and a trim figure. Admits Domar, "As she was telling me her story, I was listening to her thinking, what the hell is she doing seeing me?" It turns out that Kim was distressed by the messiness in her house. She told Domar, "Every time I open a drawer or closet and see the clutter, I feel like a miserable failure."

For Domar, that was a wake-up call about perfectionism. "Women are unhappy because, even if 11 out of 12 things are going well, they zero in on the one that isn't, and they get miserable about it." Now, bestselling author Domar (Self-Nurture), drawing on 20 years of clinical experience, has written Be Happy Without Being Perfect (Crown) to help readers cope with their own unrealistic needs to be perfect. TIME reporter Andrea Sachs spoke with Domar:

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1733856,00.html#ixzz2AtVnx49l

And even the down-to-earth Daily Mail (don't always believe what they say, you'd be amazed what they said about people doing my job!) has something pertinent to say on the matter: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2170661/Is-trying-PERFECT-ruining-life-Dream-spotless-home-career-high-voltage-love-life-flawless-body-New-research-shows-s-fatal-mistake-.html