Perfection is overrated
Yet why do we continue to strive for it
I had a meltdown over chicken quesadillas the other day.
Yup. Full on bitch fit. Suddenly everything in my life was shit. All of my distorted thinking and harsh self-criticisms came crashing in like a fucking monsoon while I frantically attempted to rectify my pathetic tortillas that clearly refused to melt together.
My mind abruptly flooded with all the skills that I lack and tasks that I royally suck at. I can’t cook. I’m not skinny enough. I’m broke. All of these irrational beliefs. What the fuck! How did I go from excited to make my fiancé dinner to suddenly melting in a pool of self-pity?(melting better than the quesadillas I might add).
As my main course continued to defy me, I realized I was acting irrational but it was too late. I was committed to the performance.
My thoughts had already started funneling down the Alice in Wonderland rabbit hole, (refer to Getting High and Avoiding Sinkholes) spiraling a mile a minute of negative thought patterns and subconscious false beliefs about myself.
Now as this undesirable and automatic phenomenon was happening, I also recognized that I was hating on myself and overreacting but I couldn’t stop. Insta stink mood. Not too mention I was hangry. It was a shit show folks.
It’s embarrassing when we act like this.
We know we’re being irrational but we can’t stop. Why is this?
Welp, there’s this concept that I studied as a psychology major that theorizes that our brain works through connections and neural pathways. Without getting too complicated, it states that essentially, one thought can trigger another thought which stimulates another thought or long-term memories. Now the real asshole is the Broca’s Area of the brain which transforms our thoughts into words (positive or negative self-talk).
The brain is a mysterious and fascinating creature. The information and false beliefs we store into our subconscious long-term memory are truly unbelievable and it isn’t until we raise our awareness and do some digging around our subconscious false beliefs that we discover the embedded barriers within us.
One of the best things I have ever heard in my recovery journey is “progress not perfection” which is a great relief to chronic fuck-ups. See, us humans are subject to error however we also put one another on pedestals. We expect our doctors to have the cure, our parents to always make us feel better, our best friends to cosign our bullshit, our therapists to have the “quick fix” and our partners to always say the right thing.
Why do we hold ourselves and one another to such high expectations and perfectionism?
Why do we feel this constant pressure to keep up with the Jones’ (or Kardashians) and fit the outdated mold of the white picket fence?
The short answer is, I don’t know.
However considering my own life experience and education, I have a few hypotheses:
a) Our subconscious has stored a core false belief from childhood that perfectionism equates success. Hence why when we don’t get that A+, or promotion, or miss the goal post by one foot we beat ourselves up because we’ve fallen short and our false beliefs tell us that we’ve failed and will never achieve success. We may believe that we are incapable of success and will forever be stuck right where we are.
b) Perhaps perfectionism was an expectation in our household as children. Your bed was to be made, your shoes tied, please and thank you, straight A’s. In other words, perfectionism was ingrained in us and in a sense normalized as an expectation. We have a deep-seeded fear of being “less than” and growing up we feared confrontation therefore we were good lil’ kiddos who obeyed to simply avoid rocking the boat and being the black sheep of the family. Or in my case getting the wooden spoon or the belt.
c) We hold an irrational, false belief that perfectionism comes with a life free of disappointment. We think that if we veer away from our goal of perfectionism, then we potentially subject ourselves to a life of troubles and heartbreak. Whether it be in the form of grief, addiction, loss, or shitty quesadillas. Essentially, perfectionism stems from fear. If we’re perfect, then we won’t have to deal with the problems of less than perfect people. How whack is that thinking?
My last thought speaks to how many perfectionists struggle with self-esteem issues and their constant yearning for perfectionism typically causes more issues in their life. I..e. Eating disorders, OCD, narcissism, anxiety, and in my case…Addiction.
My mother loves to tell the story of how my kindergarten teacher recognized my perfectionist and competitive ways, and proceeded to tell my mother that if these behaviors continued, they may likely result in problems for me in adulthood. Coming from a place of compassion, she shared this was her daughter’s experience with severe anxiety. Mine however manifested in drugs and alcohol.
As a perfectionist, we often operate as control freaks. In fact, we have a fear of not being in control, because by admitting we’re powerless and “going with the flow,” we would be allowing ourselves to trust in the unseen, the unknown, the intangible, and even more terrifying, other human beings.
We fear that tasks won’t be accomplished in general or that they won’t be accomplished how we want them to be or within our time frame. We fear that by not being perfect, we won’t be accepted and not being accepted equals failure. We’ve learned that failure is an end all. Rather then a step closer to success.
Growing up, I was in constant competition for the highest grades. If I received a 98% on a paper, I couldn’t be happy. All I could fixate on was what I did wrong in that 2%. It consumed my mind. It lowered my self-esteem. I was my biggest bully.
Transitioning into middle school, I still aspired for good grades, but academics moved to the back burner and making sure I was part of the incoming popular crowd became my number one homework assignment. This continued throughout high school and I realize now, I used the fact that I was an A student to justify skipping class and being insubordinate.
I say all that to say this: the constant pressures I placed on myself for perfectionism, whether academically or socially, made the first sip of alcohol taste all the more appetizing and freeing. The second I felt that buzz, I felt relieved. I felt relaxed and comfortable. I wasn’t worrying. My brain wasn’t fixated on perfectionism. I liked it. Then eventually I loved it. Then it progressed to my body needed it. The next drink became the new mental obsession verses perfectionism. At the end, I hated that I loved it.
Being a perfectionist, proved to be a barrier when it came to getting sober. For starters, I was trying to control my uncontrollable desire for alcohol. When I tried to focus on not drinking, my mind just focused on drinking even more. Since perfectionists often are not fond of asking for help, well…I didn’t. See, my perfectionism told me that by asking for help I was admitting I had a problem, which then makes me responsible for taking accountability and action. Furthermore, I would be admitting I was incapable of solving the problem by myself which to me, meant I wasn’t strong enough. If I were to admit I was powerless over alcohol, then I was in essence admitting that I was weak, and my competitive streak told me I had lost. People, I am a sore loser.
Ironically I discovered, that by admitting I was powerless, I actually took back some of my power.
I’m going to say that a little louder for the people watching Netflix while reading this:
By admitting I was powerless, I actually took back some of my power.
Say whaattt??!?!
In my research of how to overcome my perfectionism, I made another breakthrough discovery: Perfectionists typically suffer from procrastination.
Ever get that creepy feeling that your phone is spying on you? This was one of those moments.
“Perfectionism is procrastination in a fancy outfit” -Jen Sincero
Along with my perfectionism quality, I am also quite the acclaimed procrastinator. Some of my accomplishments include: waiting to clean my room until I moved out of my parents house. Avoiding getting gas to the point where my gas tank froze and cracked. And drumroll please… Submitting a paper that was due at 9pm at 8:59:48! (I’m still super proud of that).
Interestingly enough, perfectionism and procrastination share similar roots. There is a commonality of fear. Perfectionists often procrastinate for a fear that they won’t be able to accomplish a task or goal, so they avoid even starting it.
Are the dots connecting yet?
For me, I had a fear that if I admitted I was an alcoholic, not only was I a fucking loser, but also that the party would be over, fun would go to die, and I could never drink again. I labeled myself as an outcast and the shame seethed into my soul. My ego told me to be embarrassed and to avoid exposure and admission of guilt at all costs.
See along my journey of being a human and a raging alcoholic, I’ve made a few major discoveries. One of them being that in our mission to be our best selves, it is absofreakinlutely vital that we practice self-reflection and really analyze how our characteristics are both serving us and sometimes being a barrier. What do I mean by that? As a self-proclaimed perfectionist, I stay goal-oriented (pro) but I also beat my own ass and then effectively lose motivation and decrease my self-esteem (con). Another common example is being too trustworthy or too helpful to the point where we trust the wrong people or overextend ourselves and neglect our own needs.
Secondly, I’ve discovered that if I want to combat this perfectionism and procrastination, I need to reroute my thinking. I need to expend just as much energy as I do into negative self-talk, into the belief that I can do something and I deserve the greatness that those risks can bring. I need to be my own hype man (see How To Be Your Own Hype Man). I need to tell myself that I can recover, I can fit into those skinny jeans, I am worthy of mother’s earth’s greatness and god dammit I can cook quesadillas. Because ya know what, coincidently, I find myself saying “I can’t cook” on the regular.. And guess what… Mama burns food more often than not.
See we speak things into existence. We reinforce our negative thought patterns every time we open our mouth and affirm them with statements like “I’ll never be that skinny again. I can never go back to school. I don’t have enough money. I’ll never get sober. All men are assholes.”
Whether we realize it or not, we hear ourselves talk. Our brain registers our shit talking and that becomes the lens through which we see the world. This is also related to one of my other favorite concepts: self-fulfilling prophecy.
What I believe, I become.
So if I believe and continue to shout from the rooftops that I royally suck at relationships, I will subconsciously ruin every relationship. If I tell myself I will never lose the baby weight, I will somehow, some way, find myself elbow deep in a bag of Doritos, crying, and watching the Real Housewives of Narnia. If I have a fear of cooking because I believe that I suck at it, I will find myself having a full out mental breakdown at thirty years old in my kitchen in front of the man of my dreams and later blog about it as a way to psychoanalyze my own embarrassing behavior and hope that those still reading this can relate.
What I’ve come to realize through years of blackouts, relapses, toxic relationships, and failed entrees is this:
We are our own biggest barrier.
When we fear that we are not capable or deserving or worth it, when we program perfection as the standard, when we procrastinate what our heart really desires, when we constantly talk shit about ourselves, we close ourselves off to the possibility of fulfilling our goals and dreams. Society has set the standard for perfectionism but doesn’t that in fact, look different for each one of us?
For one person, perfectionism may look like being a present and active parent. For another, it may mean financial freedom and corporate success. For someone else, it may be staying sober and out of jail. For me, it’s making quesadillas that actually melt together.
So throw your bitch fit if it’s necessary, but don’t stay stuck there and fall down the rabbit hole of negative thinking and self-doubt. This vicious cycle prevents you from seeing all the things that you excel at. So what if you’re never what society considers perfect? And more importantly, HAVE YOU SEEN WHAT SOCIETY LOOKS LIKE THESE DAYS?!!! Some of life’s greatest contributors and blessings have been the result of imperfection. If I had not failed at being “perfect” numerous times, I would have never recovered. Perhaps the greatest lesson in striving for perfection is that it keeps us striving to be our best selves. Just remember, you can either be your best friend or your worst enemy. I don’t know about you, but these days I chose to be my best friend and perfectly imperfect.
Until next time..
- Sabrina Leigh
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LOVE IT!!!! Ohhhhhhh being a perfectionist. I could feel that in my soul.