… remember, I’ve been trying to get closer to him and failing miserably all my life … If I ask for help in removing my imperfections and God says “no” then I’m pretty much doomed to fail.
To err is human, to forgive is divine (and, God calls us to forgive one another as well).
St. Paul writes eloquently in his letters (epistles) about God not removing imperfections despite Paul’s repeated pleas to God to do so.
Paul also writes about the dilemma of knowing the perfect good that he should do, yet being unable to do it. For example, see
Romans Ch. 7, beginning with verse 14:
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold into slavery to sin. What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I concur that the law is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. For I know that good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh. The willing is ready at hand, but doing the good is not. For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. So, then, I discover the principle that when I want to do right, evil is at hand. For I take delight in the law of God, in my inner self, l but I see in my members another principle at war with the law of my mind, taking me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Miserable one that I am! Who will deliver me from this mortal body? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Therefore, I myself, with my mind, serve the law of God but, with my flesh, the law of sin.