9 Ways To Overcome & Challenge Perfectionism

Common Symptoms & Experiences Of Those With Perfectionism

1. Serious About Life

   • Difficulty with spontaneity

   • Difficulty with letting loose and having fun

2. High Personal Expectations of Self and Others

   • Tend to be critical of others who lack high expectations or standards

3. Inner Critic

   • Can be quite mean to themselves

   • Can be critical, judgmental, and demanding

4. Fears Making Mistakes

   • Risk averse

5. Work Hard in School And in Their Career 

   • Tend to be very successful 

   • Motivate themselves by criticizing and demanding 

6. Behaves Appropriately 

   • Follows the rules

   • Enjoys structure

7. Frequently Will Sacrifice Personal Needs in Order to Achieve Desired Goals or Help Others

   • Unsure of what they need and want

   • Good at anticipating what others need and want

8. Find it Difficult to Understand Emotions

   • Tries to control emotions 

   • inhibited emotional expression

   • Very logical

   • Difficult to access emotions (e.g. cry)

   • When overwhelmed with emotions, tend to feel frustrated, angry, and anxious

9. Poor Relationships With Self and Others 

   • Has aloof and distant relationships

   • Difficulty with intimacy

9 Ways To Challenge Perfectionism

1. Examine Your Thoughts

   • Binary Thinking

   • Catastrophic Thinking

   • Demanding Thinking

   • Our anxiety about future events is almost always out of proportion to the reality

   • List of types of unhelpful thinking here

2. Explore Your Perfection Part

   • What’s my earliest memory of perfectionism?

   • What are the pros and cons of perfectionism?

   • How has perfection helped me survive?

   • Does perfection prevent me from anything I care about?

3. Affirmations

   • Reminding yourself constantly the facts of perfectionism

   • Feeling and believing these thoughts is the ultimate goal

   • I don’t need to be perfect

   • Perfection doesn’t exist

   • Mistakes aren’t bad, they teach me things

   • Conflict is normal

   • I’m not a bad person if I’m imperfect
     

4. Build Your Sense of Self 

   • Self (Self worth, Self esteem, Self love, Self acceptance)

   • Take up more space

   • Learn to love yourself unconditionally

   • Look beyond achievements and material items

   • Create a life worth living

5. Practice Spontaneity

   • Try to be more flexible

   • When someone asks you to go somewhere, challenge yourself to say yes

   • Do things not on a list or calendar

6. Increase Vulnerability 

   • Share more of yourself with those you care about and trust

   • Push yourself outside your comfort zone

   • Speak your truths (even if your voice quivers)

   • Practice

7. Exploring and identifying values 

   • Who matters most to you?

   • What matters most to you?

8. Try To Worry Less About What Others Think

   • Albert Ellis experiment

     • Walking a banana on a string in a public space.

     • This exposure and countless others can be performed with the client to demonstrate that we are free to be ourselves.

     • In other words, we can accept who we are without becoming disturbed, attempting to tolerate the discomfort of judgment.

   • Ask yourself, “What does it mean if people are judging me?” and “Will I die or will it kill me if someone judges me?”

   • Most people think about themselves, not others

     • If they do, they’ll soon forget about it

     • If they do, I won’t die

9. Self Compassion

   • Treating yourself like you would a close friend

   • Meeting pain with love, thought, and care

   • Lovingkindness meditation

     • I wish you peace

     • I wish you love

     • You deserve peace

     • You deserve love

The goal is to be more open, flexible, curious, and compassionate so you can accept emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.

Types Of Therapy That Can Help Perfectionism

1. RO DBT

2. Interpersonal Therapy (IPT) 

3. Self Compassion

4. ACT