Perfectionism: The Twenty Ton Shield
A Maryland Marriage and Family Therapist on Perfectionism and How To Keep It From Taking Over Your Life.
Trying to do everything right is just exhausting. You’re setting impossibly high standards for yourself and think you should achieve your goals effortlessly and never make mistakes or have flaws. Easy, right? (Ha!)
As a recovering perfectionist, I still fall into this sometimes. Even in trying to write this I wanted to make sure I had All the information to make sure this post was as good as it could be. There is way too much information to share in one post, but I expected to be able to read it all and clearly share it.
Thankfully I thought, “What am I a robot? There is too much information to read all of it. I do need sleep.”
Now don’t get my wrong I’m all for informed pieces and healthy striving, but this procrastination of writing what I was thinking was more about getting it right.
Perfectionism-the urge to do more, achieve more, be more drives us to go non-stop.
Letting go or loosening up doesn’t even feel like an option. Even when we know it’s not working.
Anxiety or Depression can often pop up as a by-product.
This is why Brené Brown calls pefectionism the twenty-ton shield. “If I look perfect, live perfect, work perfect, I can avoid or minimize criticism, blame and ridicule”. She goes on to say “We lug it around hoping it protects us from experiencing judgement, shame, blame when all it really does is keep us from being seen. And it’s heavy AF.”
Ugh. This belief that achievement determines self-worth is heavy. And is likely covering up a sense of insecurity or not “good enough”. And perfectionism may look different from one person to another. It can have many roots.
“Look Ma no hands!!”
I will often see this with my highly sensitive teens and adults who are excellent at avoiding and noticing errors, are really conscientious, and phenomenal at tasks that require a lot of detail, speed, and accuracy. They can envision how something could be done to perfection and aim for that.
Thankfully, with some inner reflection and work we can start to move past those patterns. We can move from fear to courage.
A few things I’ve found helpful, for my clients, and in my own life in moving away from perfectionist tendencies:
Addressing any shame gremlins that pop up (Again Brené Brown here is so helpful)
Acknowledging your fears and any errors in thinking (aka cognitive distortions, also see this tip on balanced thinking)
Self-compassion work ( I love Kristen Neff’s books)
Focusing on Your Strengths
Breaking Down Tasks
Mindfulness
Setting Boundaries around Needs
Now that’s a quick and dirty list of some things that can be helpful. There are some good workbooks out there. I also find doing the inner work with a therapist (I’m biased I know) to be immensely powerful. Wherever you are on your journey with perfectionism, you are doing enough!