The Pitfalls of Perfectionism

Selam, Happy minds. This week’s blog explores a mindset that’s rather close to my heart, the most socially acceptable flaw and thief of all my happiness and time; perfectionism! I’m in good company, Bob Marley, Steve Jobs, Zendaya; the list of self-confessed successful perfectionists is long and illustrious. I’m sure many of you can relate to my habit of coyly confessing to my perfectionist tendencies at the close of every job interview, simultaneously guaranteeing that I’ll not only get the job, but will also have to arrive early and work late while flagellating myself for my apparent lack of productivity. Joy of joys.

Joking aside, this shizz is actually really serious and I’m working on it, so let’s dive into it, shall we?

The elephant in the room

There is a lie at the heart of our cultural mythos, that we have repeated so many times that we have convinced ourselves it has to be true; that hard work will always be rewarded with success. That you can do anything if you work hard and believe in yourself. That seductive and pervasive lie holds an unspoken and bitter second stanza ; If you are unhappy, unsuccessful or anything less than fabulously wealthy, well, I guess you didn’t work hard enough. “You had all the talent and the opportunities in the world kid, but I guess you blew it. Better luck next time!” (For some reason that would probably fascinate my therapist, my inner monologue apparently assumes the voice of Han Solo when administering a pseudo-ironic dressing down).

Speaking of Star Wars, is it any wonder that so many of us feel like the central character in our own story when we have mythologised success in our fictional stories of chosen ones like Luke Skywalker. Individuals who faced down impossible odds, dragged themselves through the fire and somehow overcame everything to emerge into the world reborn as a blazing phoenix. The best of everything, unbeatable, incorruptible. Perfect. In the real world, biographies of celebrities fly off the shelves as a cadre of wannabe entrepreneurs, rock stars, dancers or writers pore over their story trying to find the secret to their greatness.

Social media and instagram heightens the gap, we surround ourselves with the absurdly successful and normalise the extraordinary. We all ignore the rather obvious survivorship bias. We’re reading their story because they made it. We’re not reading Tony the flight attendants autobiography because they didn’t. Maybe their particular Magnum Opus never quite got off the ground (I’m extraordinarily sorry, I couldn’t help myself. It’s ok to make light of Tonys suffering, they’re a fictional construct) Or maybe, it just felt safer to lock it away from prying eyes, judgement and sadly, the kind of exposure which is essential if creative work is ever to be recognised and acclaimed.

You are already one in a trillion

Of course, for the majority of all the people who have ever lived, the opportunity to be truly great at something was somewhat superseded by the rather banal imperative to simply live out the day. As Stephen Jay Gould put it, “I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.” Perhaps that’s why so many of us suffer from perfectionism, because we already know that we are in the top 1% of the 1% of all humans who have ever lived if we even have a platform to put something out into the world, and paradoxically, that all just adds to the pressure. Don’t even get me started on all the people who never even got the chance to be born, my eyelids are sweating as it is.

The better you do, the better you are expected to do

Social Psychologist Thomas Curran believes that perfectionism has nothing to do with specific tasks, goals or striving for general excellence. Instead it describes the mindset and corresponding psychological pain that an individual experiences when they exhaust excessive energy attempting to perfect their imperfect self. Analogous to visualising a four sided triangle, this is a logical fallacy that can only lead to pain. Like kintsugi, the asian art of repairing broken pottery with golden seams, it is our flaws which make us human, unique and, ultimately, beautiful. To remove those is to destroy what makes us who we are. We know this, and yet because we are the only meaningful arbiters of our own successes and failures, even the largest accomplishment can be reframed as an abject failure by a perfectionist. When an achievement lies in our future, we tell ourselves that if we can attain it we might be worthy of love, success or acclaim. Once we reach it however, we twist the narrative and betray our own achievements to ourselves, cheapening them retrospectively.

“I only succeeded because others helped me”

“I had to work 3 times as hard as everyone else, so I must be stupid”

“I got lucky, I’m nothing special”

You, me or everybody else

We currently recognise 3 distinct elements inherent in a perfectionist mindset; Self-oriented perfectionism, where the individual expects unrealistic standards from themselves in all things. Socially prescribed perfectionism, where the individual perceives demands from those around them to live up to an unachievable standard, and other-oriented perfectionism, where the individual expects those around them to always deliver flawless results at all times. (Side-note; if you suspect you might fall somewhere on that spectrum of perfectionism and want to find out more, you can take the multidimensional perfectionism test here.)

Perfectionism may not be considered a mental disorder in its own right,but it is linked with a host of mental health disorders, including depression, anxiety, OCD, dietary and eating disorders and suicidal ideation. Of the three distinct modes of this condition, socially prescribed perfectionism is the one with the largest correlation with serious mental illness. It is also on the rise, and some data suggests that by 2050, 1 in 3 young people may be suffering with socially prescribed perfectionism. 

OK, it’s not perfect, so be gentle…

There is a light at the end of the tunnel, happy minds. I know we’ve all been conditioned to expect a happy ending, and I don’t intend to disappoint. Yes, perfectionism is difficult to identify and treat, creates a pathological cycle of self-inflicted pain and suffering and it’s on the rise. As with many issues, the first step is recognition and acceptance. Stop trying to bend your mind into a 4-sided triangle, instead embrace the maxim ‘good enough’. An infinite number of monkeys equipped with an infinite number of typewriters might produce Shakespeare, but there’s only one of you and your deadline was two days ago, so wrap it up, starshine.

Perfectionism develops in a child’s formative years so as parents, aunts, and uncles we can do everything in our power to support our young people and stop this epidemic in its tracks by offering unconditional support when they try and fail. Because fail we must if are to ever learn anything that’s really worth learning. We know this, so let’s embrace it and shout it from the rooftops.  But, we are the keeper of the keys to the prison of our own minds. We can walk out anytime we choose, but it’s a choice we have to keep making day after day after day. 

As the late great Bob Marley wrote, ‘emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds’. Now imagine a world in which he just tore out the page and threw it into the bin.

If you find that you’re struggling with perfectionist tendencies and even the simplest task seems to take up more of your time than it should, you might enjoy our ‘Managing Time’ course. Featuring proven strategies to tame perfectionism, supercharge your organisation and squeeze every drop of productivity out of your day. As always, thanks for reading!