Why you're going about recovering from perfectionism all wrong

Happy Sunday, Soothers. Life's a bit busy right now as I ramp up Soothe and a few other offerings, so I'm re-running an excerpt from the archives, on a topic I know NOBODY in this audience struggles with — perfectionism. Enjoy!

Happy Sunday, Soothers. The idea for this week’s Soother percolated in my brain after reading this (as per usual) excellent advice essay from Heather Havrilesky at Ask Polly (it may be subscribers only). It’s worth a read but the issue boils down to this fact: the reader realizes she is dealing with perfectionism, and it’s impacted her life in so many negative ways, and now she’s trying to stop being so perfectionistic. Of course, the only problem is that SHE MUST STOP BEING SO PERFECTIONISTIC!!! Which is, of course, itself…perfectionism.

Havrilesky catches on to this right away, leaping in with this paragraph:

Wow! Do you see what you just did? You took your current challenge — to accept yourself and embrace the present moment — and turned it into an all-or-nothing quest for perfection! According to you, you can either love yourself and accept death immediately or you’ll never find lasting love or enjoy your job or have a single friend under the sun! YOU CAN EITHER SWIFTLY CONQUER THIS EXISTENTIAL PUZZLE (that humankind has struggled with, often fruitlessly, for thousands of years) OR SAY GOODBYE TO JOY FOREVER!

Havrilesky, is, of course, correct, but I have so much empathy too for the advice seeker, because her perspective is how for most of my life I tried to succeed, to gain acceptance, to reach the sacred destination on a hill of being a perfect person.

I meditated. I journaled. I worked out. I went to therapy. I read self-help books. I did rigorous skin care. I tried to curb my introverted tendencies and receive friendship and social invitations. I got on the dating apps. I tried not to be angry. I tried to see things from multiple perspectives. I tried to have compassion for others. I volunteered. I donated. I tried every mindfulness app on the planet in an attempt to suffocate my anxiety. I got 7.5 hours of sleep a night. I increased productivity at work, I read leadership books, I watched TED Talks on how to be fitter, happier, more fulfilled.

I tried my damn hardest to be a good person, to bleach myself of any imperfections, to robotically march myself forward into a version of myself that was finally, FINALLY! cured of all of my flaws. Because, that’s like… the point of life, right?

No.

I call this approach now, looking back, “murdering your village of weirdos.”

Let me explain.

A while back I wrote a Soother essay about two healing approaches I tried that had a massive impact on healing my shame. (And spoiler alert, if you see yourself in my above paragraphs, you are likely dealing with a significant amount of shame even if you are not aware of it.)

One of them was “parts work” or focusing, and in my first-ever session, this is what unfolded:

For close to two hours, she guided me into a quiet state where I was paying attention to what feelings were arising, whether they came out in my body (aches or pain), my mind (thoughts), or as images.

At first, nothing really happened. I have the thing where you can’t visualize (you might have read this article about it) so it was just a lot of trying to tune in, a LOT of silence, and occasionally a gentle question from Sandy.

But eventually, something came through… it wasn’t quite an image, since I don’t visualize. It was more an… impression.

We had been talking about my struggles with feeling confident, starting a business, not feeling like I really knew myself… and all of a sudden, I was in the midst of this (it’s trippy, hang on):

There was a village of little people living in me. Imagine, like, The Smurfs, or Gulliver’s Travels and the Lillput. It was kind of an old-timey village; people were walking around, living in huts and cabins, doing stuff like, blacksmithing, or whatever people did in villages like several hundred years ago. They were living a nice life. It was bustling and cheery.

But then… I came along. I was like a Giant Catherine, or a Gulliver, at the edge of their awareness. They knew I was coming, and they all raced to hide.
In that moment, I knew: They were scared of me. They knew they had to be silent when I was around. They didn’t want me to see them, or even know they were there. They were afraid I would hurt them.

I realized in that very moment that I had been trying to bleach myself of my own emotions, my own imperfections, my own entire self. I was on a quest for a “perfect” version of myself — one where I never felt bad things, never did “bad” things, one where I was just this like… saintly, perfect, emotionless, beautiful robot.
And my own self was scared of me. All of my emotions, my doubts, my parts of me that were “less than” would run and hide when I came about because they knew I was trying to exterminate them in this robotic, ruthless quest for acceptance and perfection.

In that moment, Giant Traveling Catherine arrived in the village and told the villagers to come out. She/I apologized for having tried to eradicate them. She/I could just see they were just… being. Just people being, in all their perfections and imperfections, their beauty and flaws. Just living.

The villagers came out and cheered, and waved me off as I sailed away, promising that I would come back and visit often.

I shit you not.

Yup. That was what happened.

I could ruminate further on it, but I think the story and the lesson is quite clear, and in that moment during the Focusing session, I knew then:

I accept myself as I am, with all of my mess.

I have to. I’m killing myself trying not to.

So I shall just… be. Me. All of me.

So. Are you trying to murder your village of weirdos?

Are you trying to bleach your insides, improve yourself half to death, become a more perfect version?

Are you trying to recover from perfectionism, whether you’re aware of it or not, by going on an endless and fruitless quest for perfection?

If so, here’s where to start.
Write down everything about yourself you think you have to fix, improve, or eradicate.

For me, it would look like the following (actually much longer than this but we’ll start here)

• I’m grumpy

• I’m anxious

• I never want to hang out with almost anybody, yet I constantly crave deeper friendship and connection

• I’m judgmental

• I’m bossy and know-it-all-y and have tendencies to push my beliefs on people

• I’m incredibly hard on myself

• I buy dozens of books that I read the first third of and never finish

• I’m self-pitying sometimes

• I bite my nails

• I think everybody should be working as hard as I’m working, AND I’m also proud that I feel I’m working harder than everybody else (??? see? it’s a mess up in here)

• I honestly still have no idea how to spend the bulk of my days as an entrepreneur, and I’ve been doing this for two years, I spend a lot of time wandering around my apartment (granted COVID, but still)

• I’m impatient

• I’m a bit of a snob

Average human stuff, and yet, I thought for the longest time that these were the things about myself I needed to “fix.”

So write your own list, then ask yourself, for each: how can you come into relationship with these traits?

It doesn’t have to be a LOVING relationship. It can be a grumpy, resentful or annoyed relationship, at least to start with.

But it has to be a relationship.

Your village of weirdos is waiting for you to acknowledge them, without coming in with a Rambo gun full of self-help bleach trying to annihilate them, trying to journal or meditate them away into obliteration.

So acknowledge these things about yourself. Then, take it one step further: Write this full list of all of your things, and also write in the beautiful things about you. For me? I’m creative, I’m compassionate, I’m ambitious, I’m brave, I’m funny, I’m weird, I’m willing, I’m loving, I’m sensitive, I’m spiritual, I’m accepting, I’m fashionable, I have a great sense for design… etc.

Then take all of these together, all the weirdos and the good, and read them out loud to yourself in a mirror, making eye contact with yourself as you say, “I am…” (Another thing I like about myself is I’m cheerfully earnest and willing to ask people to do these kinds of exercises, because they work.)

And there, you start. You’re on the path. To living amongst your village of weirdos, instead of trying to murder them. To breaking bread with them, waving at them from your mailbox, running into them at the grocery store and making pleasantries, your dogs leaping around joyfully together.

It probably will take some time to settle in. After all, who’s used to living in a village of anxiety, of doubt, of grumpiness, of bossiness, of all these things we’ve been told our whole lives that we should be getting rid of?

So accept that this a journey. A settling into a new home. This isn’t an overnight Airbnb vacation. You live here.

You. Live. Here.

They live here.

We live here.

Let us root into this community. Let’s live in it, its ups and downs, its goods and bads, its sunny days and the storms, its manicured yards and its messy ones, and all that comes in a town, a world, a life.

Because what else is there to do?

So let us begin.