New year’s resolutions are catnip for perfectionism. Each January we are invited to reinvent ourselves as fitter, more productive, more virtuous, with the rollover of the calendar offering us a clean slate and a chance to correct our flaws.
While reasonable goals for modest self-improvement can be healthy, when these resolutions are perfectionistic, they become all-or-nothing tests of our self-worth. Make a mistake, miss a day at the gym, and the whole project collapses in a spiral of self-reproach. But the problem is not your willpower – it is perfectionism itself.
Perfectionism has a good public face but it frequently masks painful private struggles.
In the therapy room it is a foe to be vanquished if our patients are to live happier and more authentic lives. The challenge is that perfectionism tends to masquerade as diligence and achievement. Who wouldn’t want to do things properly, to high standards, to the best of their ability?
Perfectionists thus generally wish to rid themselves of the negative consequences of this trait – anxiety, depression and burnout – but not to lower their standards. This is hardly surprising given that perfectionism is often rewarded and praised and thus positively reinforced. Yet beneath the surface, it is often less about excellence than about fear.
Perfectionism is associated with the pursuit of quality but it is more accurately characterised by a fear of failure. Healthy striving – a flexible wish to improve and to do a good job – is not the same as perfectionism, which tends to be rigid, driven by anxiety and unrelenting self-criticism. It thrives on shame – any flaw or mistake is taken as evidence of personal defectiveness. And because perfection is unattainable, the perfectionist is condemned to chronic dissatisfaction and fear of exposure.
This fear of failure can paradoxically result in behaviours that limit success. Procrastination is strongly associated with perfectionism. If something cannot be done perfectly, it is safer not to do it at all. And the belief that a task must be done perfectly can induce overwhelm, leading to paralysis and avoidance.
Furthermore, perfectionists struggle to finish tasks as they are never deemed adequate. These problems are captured in the warning, commonly attributed to Voltaire, to not to let the “perfect be the enemy of the good”.
Even when perfectionism results in high achievement, it brings only fleeting satisfaction. A nagging fear often remains that the work is not as good as others think and that its flaws will soon be discovered.
This was the case for Julie*, a 37-year-old academic, who sought therapy for chronic exhaustion and escalating anxiety related to her work. She was well regarded by colleagues and consistently received positive feedback, even winning awards for her research. Yet Julie described feeling that she was “only one mistake away” from being exposed as inadequate. She spent hours rewriting lectures and replayed minor missteps late into the night.
The therapist noticed that Julie framed her self-worth only in terms of her performance – I am only acceptable if I perform perfectly. Together, they traced this belief back to childhood experiences in which positive attention from her parents had been closely tied to achievement. Mistakes had not been punished overtly but they had been met with disappointment and disconnection. Over time, Julie had developed an internal representation of this dynamic, an inner “voice” that constantly harassed her about perceived failures and drove her to work harder.
Therapy with Julie was tricky because she was desperately afraid of lowering her unrelenting standards. She was also invested in “doing therapy perfectly” and feared disappointing the therapist. This put her in a challenging position given that the goal of therapy was for her to be more self-compassionate, flexible with her standards and prepared to tolerate “failures”.
Over time, and with the support of a therapist who recognised her value as a person, Julie was able to differentiate between “good enough” and perfect. As she cut back on her excessive work habits, she noticed that her colleagues still respected her and her students continued to benefit, even when a lecture wasn’t perfectly prepared.
She began sleeping better and there was a gradual reduction in her anxiety. She was surprised to find that her connection with her students and other staff improved as a result, and that work became a happier place for her.
Sadly, perfectionists like Julie face an uphill battle in the modern world. Social media provides an endless stream of flawless bodies, exemplary parenting and productivity hacks. Students absorb the message that missteps can derail their future. KPIs rule the workplace. Being simply “good enough” can feel like a moral failure. Appropriate experimentation and learning from mistakes are thus discouraged, at the expense of innovation, curiosity and creativity.
None of this is an argument against standards, care or responsibility. The challenge is to reclaim healthy striving from perfectionism’s grip. Healthy striving accepts limits and understands that error is integral to mastery. In The Gifts of Imperfection, Brené Brown emphasises that healthy striving is self-focused: “How can I improve?” and distinct from perfectionism which is other-focused: “What will they think?”
The antidote to perfectionism would be to treat the new year not as a demand for transformation but as an invitation to experiment, set modest and attainable goals, be compassionate and encouraging when you hit a road bump, pivot when needed, and accept that our flaws deepen our humanity.
*Julie is a fictitious amalgam to exemplify many similar cases that we see. The therapist is a fictional amalgam of both authors
• Prof Gill Straker and Dr Jacqui Winship are co-authors of The Talking Cure. Gill also appears on the podcast Three Associating in which relational psychotherapists explore their blind spots
