Have you ever felt anxious at the idea of making a mistake? Do you hold yourself to a higher standard than you hold others? Does fear of failure make you avoid trying things you’re not positive you can do (and do well)? Do you worry about what other people might think of you if they see your house a mess or you go out without top-notch personal grooming? Do people who act playfully or foolishly in public make you uncomfortable? Do you get upset at the idea of what others might think of you as a parent if your kid decides not to wear their coat in the middle of winter?
Have you ever wished you could just let your hair down and cut yourself some slack, but can’t for the life of you figure out how to get there from here within your own thinking? I’ve been there too! Here’s an exploration of perfectionism and what finally worked for me in breaking free of the rigid straitjacket that it creates.
The Making of a Perfectionist
I spent my early life as one of those gifted children who quickly infers that their value resides in the scales and measurements imposed by those around them: grades, test scores, game scores, IQ, body measurements, how well they follow the rules. You soon become dependent on the comparisons, praise, recognition, and feedback from others to tell you who you are.
What no one tells you is that once positive feedback becomes your drug, you tend to decide you have to be perfect to keep it coming – always going above and beyond and certainly never making a mistake, because then who would you be?
When a perfectionist foresees the possibility of falling short, the anxiety and self-condemnation can be overwhelming. You start to catastrophize the smallest misstep, telling yourself that whatever shortcoming or minor mistake just arose has ruined everything and proves you’re stupid, ridiculous, ugly, fat, worthless, an idiot, blind, missing the point, not good enough – insert whatever withering comment fits for you.
Did it strike you as odd that this happened to me as a gifted child? It shouldn’t. One of the problems with excelling at seemingly “everything” is that you never learn to be okay with just being okay. You’ve got so many people in authority telling you you’re “better than” everyone else, it’s easy to start feeling different in an inexorable and isolating way. And let’s not forget that other kids start to feel jealous and self-hating around you (remember, they’re being told by default that they’re “less than”), which only adds to the experience. So now just being you has become painful – to both yourself and (apparently) everyone around you. Mix in media messaging, pre-teen angst, and teenage hormones, and you’ve got quite the stew brewing. It’s no wonder girls develop eating disorders during these years.
What is Perfectionism?
Psychology researchers Paul Hewitt and Gordon Flett assert that there are three main flavors of perfectionism:
- Self-oriented perfectionists who set and maintain their own strict standards and stringent self-evaluation
- Socially prescribed perfectionists who believe that others hold strict and often unrealistic expectations and standards that the perfectionist feels pressured to meet or risk being stringently evaluated
- Other-oriented perfectionists who set and maintain strict standards for those around them and stringently evaluate others
In an article on her web site Personal Excellence, life coach and blogger Celestine Chua lists 10 tell-tale signs that you may be a perfectionist. These include being hyper-conscious and hyper-critical of mistakes, aiming to be the best at everything you do, being compulsive about getting things right, setting black-and-white ideals, having a defensive attitude toward criticism, harboring a fear of failure, focusing on the end goal rather than the process (and feeling devastated/worthless if it doesn’t turn out exactly as envisioned), having an all-or-nothing approach, giving up if you can’t do something perfectly, and being hyper-conscious of what others might think about you – especially if that thought might be that you’re fallible (i.e., not perfect).
Dr. Albert Ellis, the founder of rational emotive behavioral therapy and considered the grandfather of cognitive behavioral therapy, points to thought patterns and emotions that go along with perfectionism, which include “should” and “should not” rules and judgments, anxiety, panic, blame and hostility toward others, shame and embarrassment in the presence of others, shyness (fear of being judged), self-damnation, and “awfulizing” thoughts that exaggerate your own badness and/or the impact of your actions.
The Impact of Perfectionism
All that said, it is not surprising that researchers have established a strong correlation between perfectionism and mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and suicide.
As early as the age of 11, I was beginning to grasp and articulate the corrosive effects of perfectionism on my own happiness and self-esteem. I hated my compulsion to prove my worth through my performance, my fear of falling short, my self-condemnation and feelings of isolation. It was not a fun or enjoyable way to live. And yet, I could not escape it. Everywhere I turned, I was driven back to the cattle chute of my own perfectionism, which demanded… well, perfection. Anything else was a lazy excuse. (Sound familiar?)
The Escape Hatch
And then I had an inspiration – a spark of an idea that lit a bonfire in my brain and ultimately short-circuited my perfectionism, opening up a doorway to a wholly different – and holistic – way of living. That idea was the concept of being perfectly imperfect. By this I don’t mean accepting my imperfection as already “perfect.” While I have seen this approach work for others, my brain refused to wrap around the apparent illogic of it – how could “imperfection” be “perfect”? I wasn’t there yet. My young soul sensed that I needed to escape the gravitational pull of perfectionism altogether, not simply redefine it in a way that felt like an expedient self-delusion.
Instead, I decided to actively use my perfectionism to achieve a goal – something perfectionists are exceptionally good at doing. And that goal was imperfection.
I remember that this blew my mind when I first recognized the simple elegance of it. It excited me more than anything before in my young life – because I recognized in my bones that it would work.
Where to Begin
I realized I had to start by deciding what “imperfection” meant. What was my goal? To me, it meant being deeply human. Flawed. Authentic. Sometimes weak and sometimes strong. Sometimes good at things and sometimes lost. Sometimes completely lovable and sometimes a jerk. Sometimes talented and sometimes clumsy. Sometimes driven and energetic and sometimes uninterested or tired. Sometimes having the answers and sometimes drawing a blank. Like I said, human.
Okay, goal set. Now how does a perfectly imperfect person feel and think and act? Among other things, they are tolerant and loving toward themselves and others, and positive and flexible in their thinking.
Um, how does a scared, self-critical, compulsive person bridge that gap?
Compassion: The Key to Overcoming Perfectionism
What I discovered as I turned my not-insubstantial intellect and determination – and most importantly, perfectionist tendencies – toward this new goal was that the number one trait that was required in achieving my goal was none other than compassion. I soon realized that the entire exercise would fail without it.
Beverly Engel, LMFT, defines compassion as “the ability to understand the emotional state of another person or oneself. Often confused with empathy, compassion has the added element of having a desire to alleviate or reduce the suffering of another” – or oneself, presumably. I had to find it in me to feel empathy and compassion for myself and to find ways to alleviate my own suffering. The best part about this was that it required a level of self-acceptance that no self-respecting perfectionist bent on being perfectly imperfect would shy away from developing: thus the short circuit that saved – and changed –my life.
As you may suspect, there were layers and layers of learning that took place over years of self-actualization, but it all started with compassion. Shame researcher Brené Brown writes a good deal about the importance of vulnerability, empathy, shame resilience, and emotional curiosity, and any of her books is a great place to start in finding a language in which to explore the fears, anxieties, and thought patterns that live behind perfectionism.
A coaching conversation can of course be another excellent resource in supporting you on this journey, on which I would be honored to accompany you. Please don’t hesitate to reach out!
