Being perfect can also be a defense against a chaotic, unpredictable or unsafe home. Culture and the media also have a strong influence on perfectionism. Most American media outlets still feature tall, very slim, Caucasian models. Children grow up with this unattainable vision of beauty. We are saturated with this message, making it easy to believe that if we dont look like those models, we are not pretty enough or goodenough. Some cultures and institutions such asschools promote a perfectionist mindset.
For others, perfectionism is self-imposed. If no one explicitly accepted you just as you are, you may turn to achievement as a measure of self-worth. I want you to untangle this connection. Your achievement is not who you are. Successis not a measure of your worth. You are perfectly flawed and perfectly wonderful all at the same time.
And your suggestions for articletopics related to perfectionism are always welcome in the comments. Join me on Facebook. More articles. More inspiration. More happiness! Why do we need to live life? But even outside of clinical disorders, perfectionism can lead to significant problems in daily life, impacting everything from our productivity and work performance to our relationships and physical health.
Below are a few examples of some of the costs of perfectionism:. And if we can get a clearer picture of the mechanisms involved in perfectionism, we will have a much better shot at resolving it.
We tend to think about perfectionism in terms of behaviors and outcomes—acing the exam, hitting our sales numbers each week, ensuring the dinner party goes just right, etc. In other words, perfectionism appears to be about perfecting things out there in the world. This makes some sense given that the behaviors associated with perfectionism are visible and easy to spot: Staying at work late every night, reviewing the report for a fifth time, putting in an extra half hour on the elliptical, etc.
Or even the most important part of the story. The way we think about perfectionism is strongly influenced by the way it looks; but looks, as we all know, can be deceiving. Most people with perfectionism will admit that they know intuitively that on some level their expectations and efforts toward achieving perfect outcomes are both unrealistic and detrimental, that true perfection is impossible. Perfectionists know that achieving perfection and doing things perfectly is impossible, and yet they feel driven to keep trying anyway.
Most perfectionism begins as a childhood response to some form of trauma actual or perceived and its emotional consequences:. In each case, the habit of striving for perfection was initially triggered by a disturbing situation and the need to ease a painful emotion. This habit of striving for perfection becomes strengthened because on some level it works.
On the one hand, it may actually prevent harm, as in the case of the child who obsessively plans for every possible contingency regarding their abusive parent. By throwing themselves into their school work and getting good grades, the forgotten middle child is able to distract themselves temporarily from the sadness that comes from feeling dismissed and devalued by their parents. And each time we follow through with this push, we strengthen the connection between painful emotion and perfectionistic striving.
Which makes that initial push stronger and stronger as time goes on. This is how vicious cycles get formed. The first level of perfectionism reduction involves identifying our emotional triggers for perfectionistic behavior and substituting alternative coping strategies with fewer downsides. When you start to notice yourself engaging in your usual perfectionistic behavior like re-checking your work for the 5th time , use that as a reminder to check in with yourself emotionally.
Ask yourself:. For example, if loneliness is your trigger, you might call a friend who always picks up and is easy to talk to. Or send a random silly text to a sibling, or take the dog to the dog park, or whatever activity tends to help you feel more connected to people. The point is to have a collection of go-to strategies ready ahead of time so that when the emotion strikes, you have several alternatives to perfectionism ready at hand and easy to implement.
The first level of perfectionism reduction is an okay place to start—identifying the emotional triggers for perfectionistic behavior and substituting new, less destructive behaviors that meet the same emotional need as the perfectionism. You can be aware of your painful emotions and really feel them without doing anything to try and reduce them or make them go away, including perfectionistic behaviors or any other coping strategy. This is, by the way, the essence of mindfulness : To be aware without thinking or doing anything.
Just observe. Why would I just let my painful emotions happen without trying to reduce them? I get it. Just sitting with and tolerating uncomfortable emotions feels dumb, not to mention painful. Even the really painful ones. And there are consequences to treating them as if they were. But they do feel dangerous. Unless we do something about them, that is. Which is why most of us are in the habit of instantly trying to fix or distract ourselves from uncomfortable or painful emotions.
Turns out… Not much. Again, this is the whole idea behind mindfulness. But if we always take action to reduce our emotion or distract ourselves from them, we never get the chance to really learn that for ourselves.
And how will this help my perfectionism? The habit of always doing something in response to uncomfortable emotions is itself the problem. Running away reinforces beliefs that our emotions are dangerous, making us even more likely to run away from them and toward a coping mechanism like perfectionism instead. This knowledge gives us the freedom and confidence to accept and ride out our emotions rather than compulsively trying to make them go away. The secret to overcoming perfectionism is to practice being tolerant of our emotions.
Especially the ones that are strongly associated with perfectionistic behaviors. I recommend starting to keeping a small journal or simple notes file on your phone. Whenever you feel the pull toward perfectionism, take a few minutes to reflect and answer the following questions:. Do this exercise long enough, and it will start to become painfully obvious what your emotional triggers for perfectionism are.
The idea is to build up a tolerance to the discomfort of negative emotion. Then after two minutes, you can decide to go ahead with the perfectionistic behavior anyway or choose to do something else. After a while, try bumping the time up to 4 minutes, then 7. Finally, building a mindfulness practice is a great way to practice both emotional awareness and emotional tolerance. Most of the advice out there on overcoming perfectionism falls flat because it comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of what causes perfectionism.
When we understand this fundamental difference, we can more successfully target our efforts to change by working to become more aware and tolerant of our emotions. And if we can do this—accept our emotions rather than run from them—we can remove the need for perfectionism in the first place.
Thanks so much for helping me to understand why I am different from my other siblings. Today I am still fighting that battle. Very insightful! I can relate to the article. I guess am somehow guilty of this attitude. Thanks for the jolt Nick! Thanks, Ana! From my personal experience, perfectionism is strongly connected with generalized anxiety and it all comes down to the illusion that one can actually have control over life itself.
Under this illusion we strive to fix everything and avoid every single unexpected, uncomfortable and uneasy instance of our lives. If you suspect that perfectionism is interfering with your well-being, speak to your doctor. They may recommend therapy or other strategies to help manage your symptoms. Atelophobia is the fear of being imperfect. This phobia can interrupt daily life and functioning. We explain what it is, symptoms, treatment, and more.
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