From Chapter One: ARE YOU A PERFECTIONIST?

Susan had been working frantically for the last month trying to get her end-of-the-year books in order, keep the business running, and plan a New Year's Eve party for her friends and her clients. A few of her friends who have been supportive of Susan's interior design business were going to bring along some potential clients. Susan's home is a reflection of her talent as a designer, so she wanted to make some changes to the formal dining room before the party that she thought would be particularly impressive. It all came together in time for the party and the evening seemed to be going well, until her assistant, Charles, asked her if Mrs. Beale and Mr. Sandoval, two important clients, had arrived. Mrs. Beale had a small antique shop in town and had referred Susan a lot of business over the past two years. Mr. Sandoval was a member of the local Chamber of Commerce and had shown interest in Susan's business.

Susan felt like her head was about to explode when she realized that she had forgotten to invite them to the party.

"Oh no, I completely forgot. How could I be so stupid? What am I going to do? They'll no doubt hear about it from someone and will assume I omitted them on purpose. I am such an idiot. I may as well kiss the business good-bye. When the word gets out, no one will want to refer to me again."

"Susan, don't you think you may be overreacting a little." Charles tried to be supportive, but deep down inside he was glad he hadn't been the one to make such an awful mistake.

For the rest of the night she held her breath waiting for her other clients to ask about Mrs. Beale and Mr. Sandoval. What would she say? That she was a thoughtless numbskull who neglected to invite a former client who referred a substantial amount of business to her each year? Even worse, what will she say when Mrs. Beale and Mr. Sandoval confront her with her rudeness. Ten different excuses ran through her mind, but she ultimately chose to avoid them and their wrath.

Susan is an inwardly focused perfectionist. Although it can help her in her work, it also hurts her when she is hard on herself and finds error completely unacceptable. Like many people, she worries about what others will think of her and her business. However, in Susan's case her errors lead to humiliation, distress, sleepless nights, and withdrawal from others. She has trouble letting go and forgiving herself because, in her mind, it is OK for others to make mistakes, but it is not OK for her to make mistakes. This book was written to help people like Susan stop beating themselves up and, instead, make the most of their skills as a perfectionist.

Tom is an outwardly focused perfectionist. He feels OK about himself, but he is often disappointed in and frustrated with others who seem to always let him down. Quality control is his line of work, but he cannot always turn it off when he leaves the office. Tom drove into his garage to find that there was still a mess on the workbench and floor that his son, Tommy, had left two days ago.

He walked through the door and said to his wife in an annoyed tone of voice, "I told Tommy to clean up his mess in the garage before I got home."

"He just got home himself a few minutes ago," his wife defended.

"Where is he now? He better not be on the phone." Tom went to his son's room only to find Tommy on the phone with his girlfriend. Tom could feel himself tensing up. "Get off the phone and go clean up that mess in the garage like I told you."

"Yes, sir." Tommy got off the phone, knowing that a lecture was coming.

Tom cannot understand why his son cannot follow simple instructions. It seems like every day there is something new. He doesn't listen, his wife doesn't take care of things on time, and the burden usually falls on him. There is always an excuse. Even when they do their parts it usually isn't good enough and they don't seem to care. It is so frustrating for Tom sometimes that he does the job himself rather than ask for help, just so he doesn't have to deal with their procrastination and excuses.

Tom's type of perfectionism causes him problems in his relationships with others because he is frequently frustrated by their failure to meet his expectations. When he tries to point this out in a gentle way, it still seems to lead to tension, and sometimes to conflict. He has tried to train himself to expect nothing from others, but that strategy doesn't seem to work either. He needs some new ideas for coping with his frustration and for how to deal with the people in his life who seem to continually let him down.

This book will help you to identify, evaluate, and change the underlying beliefs that affect your management of stressful events and your interactions with others, particularly those who leave you thinking that either you or they are not good enough. The first goal will be to gain a better understanding of how thinking that things or that you are not good enough are related to difficulties you may have at home, on the job, or in relationships. By following along in this first chapter and completing the self-assessment at the end you will determine the degree to which you are a perfectionist and in what ways it is most likely to affect your life. You will find out if you are a more inwardly focused perfectionist like Susan or a more outwardly focused perfectionist like Tom. Because perfectionism can be a very positive trait, you will need to identify the situations or circumstances in which it serves you well in addition to those situations in which it seems to hurt you. Accomplishing this second goal will help focus your attention on learning new ways to cope with times when perfectionism seems to be getting in the way or causing you distress.

The third goal of this book is to teach you to identify times when your perfectionistic beliefs about yourself or others may be inaccurate or distorted in some way and how to straighten out the distortions. If you have a more accurate view of yourself and your world you will be less prone to the emotional upset caused by those distortions. One such belief is the notion that youhave tobe perfect or that othershave tobe perfect.

One of the common problems faced by both kinds of perfectionists is having expectations that are too high or that are difficult to achieve without considerable wear and tear on you and on others. The fourth goal of this book is to help you to determine if your expectations are too high, how close you are to achieving your goals, and what you will need to do to reach a more satisfying level.

Much of the stress that leaves you thinking that you or others are not good enough results from your interactions with other people. It is often difficult to pinpoint the cause of these tensions and to determine what to do about them. Therefore, the fifth and final goal of this book is to help you deal more effectively with other people. Some guidelines are provided on how to manage situations with others that are often difficult, discouraging, or conflictual. Some helpful hints have also been included for the people in your life who want to learn how to interact with you in a way that does not leave you with the sense that you are not good enough.

These methods are based on cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT), a scientifically proven effective treatment for many of the psychological difficulties associated with perfectionism. Starting first with education about perfectionism, then working through the cognitive-behavioral methods for controlling the distress associated with perfection, you will gain a more accurate view of yourself and of others. You will learn what it means to be good enough, see how close you really are to achieving your goals, and reduce the emotional pain associated with seeing yourself and others as not good enough.

THE PERSONAL PAIN OF PERFECTIONISTS

The reach for perfection can be painful because it is often driven by both a desire to do well and a fear of the consequences of not doing well. This is the double-edged sword of perfectionism. On the one hand, it is a good thing to give the best effort, to go the extra mile, and to take pride in one's performance, whether it is keeping a home looking nice, writing a report, repairing a car, or doing brain surgery. It is commendable to attend to details, care about what others will think about your work, and constantly strive to do your best. On the other hand, when despite great efforts you feel as though you keep falling short, never seem to get things just right, never have enough time to do your best, are self-conscious, feel criticized by others, or cannot get others to cooperate in doing the job right the first time, you end up feeling bad.

The difficulty can begin with setting extremely high and sometimes unreasonable goals for yourself or for others. You may not always be aware that you are setting a high goal, you may just have a "gut-level feeling" about how a project or task ought to be done. Unfortunately, in the course of life, perfectionists find that much of the time these standards cannot be met without a great deal of effort and energy, including emotional, psychological, and physical energy. What's wrong with setting high standards and working hard? The problem is not in having high standards or in working hard. Perfectionism becomes a problem when it causes emotional wear and tear or when it keeps you from succeeding or from being happy. Dr. Sidney J. Blatt of Yale University, an expert in this area, has described the destructiveness of perfectionism as an endless striving in which each task is seen as a challenge and no effort is ever good enough, yet the person continues in desperation to avoid mistakes, achieve perfection, and gain approval. The emotional consequences of perfectionism include fear of making mistakes, stress from the pressure to perform, and self-consciousness from feeling both self-confidence and self-doubt. It can also include tension, frustration, disappointment, sadness, anger, or fear of humiliation. These are common experiences for inwardly focused perfectionists. Do any of these sound familiar?

Perfectionism seems to be a psychological vulnerability that stays in the background as you conduct your life. The emotional stress caused by the pursuit of perfection and the failure to achieve this goal can evolve into more severe psychological difficulties. For example, researchers who study perfectionism, including Dr. Paul Hewitt of the University of British Columbia and Dr. Gordon Flett of York University, have found that perfectionists are more vulnerable to depression when stressful events occur, particularly those that leave them feeling as though they are not good enough. In many ways, perfectionistic beliefs set a person up to be disappointed, given that achieving perfection consistently is impossible, or at least hard to come by. Perfectionists who have a family history of depression and may therefore be more biologically vulnerable to developing the psychological and physical symptoms of major depression may be particularly sensitive to events that stimulate their self-doubt and their fear of rejection or humiliation.

The same seems to be true for eating disorders, such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia. Several recent studies have found that even after treatment, where weight was restored in malnourished and underweight women with anorexia, their perfectionistic beliefs persisted and likely contributed to relapse. Their beliefs that they were not good enough were so strong that despite physical evidence that they were too thin or unhealthy, they persisted in pushing themselves to achieve the perfect shape. They say to themselves, "If only I were thin enough I would be OK." Thomas E. Joiner, Jr., and his colleagues at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston found, in their study of nearly a thousand women, that, for women who viewed themselves as overweight, perfectionism was one of the strongest risk factors for developing an eating disorder.

Sometimes the pain of perfectionism is felt in relationships with others. Perfectionists can sometimes put distance between themselves and others unintentionally by demanding perfection, being intolerant of others' mistakes, or by flaunting perfect behavior or accomplishments in front of those who are aware of being merely average. Although they feel justified in their beliefs about what is right and what is wrong, they still suffer the pain of loneliness. Research suggests that people who have more outwardly focused perfectionism are less likely than inwardly focused perfectionists to suffer from depression or anxiety when they are stressed. However, interpersonal difficulties at home or on the job may be more common.

The good news is that CBT has been proven to be effective for the treatment of depression, eating disorders, anxiety disorders, and relationship difficulties, in many cases even more effective than treatment with medication. Unfortunately, despite CBT's ability to control the symptoms of these disorders, perfectionism seems to be one factor that keeps people from fully recovering or from staying well. The interventions described in this book pick up where standard treatments with CBT leave off, by specifically targeting the underlying beliefs that fuel perfectionism.

Perfectionism is a problem when:

it keeps you from succeeding or from being happy;
no effort is ever good enough;
you never seem to have enough time to do your best;
you are self-conscious or feel criticized by others;
you cannot get others to cooperate in doing the job right the first time;
your standards cannot be met without a great deal of effort and emotional, psychological, and physical energy;
it causes emotional wear and tear;
you become fearful of making mistakes or of being humiliated;
it leaves you feeling tense, frustrated, disappointed, sad, or angry;
it distorts your perception of yourself;
it creates tension in your personal relationships.

HOW DID I GET THIS WAY?

Was I Born this Way?

There has been some controversy over the years about the nature of personality or temperament. Is it something you are born with or is your personality shaped by the experiences of your life? There is considerable scientific evidence that many personality traits are, in fact, inherited genetically. For example, researchers have found that some characteristics, such as sociability, are more similar in identical twins, those that share the same genes, than in fraternal twins who only share half of their genes. Those personality characteristics that you are born with are often referred to as temperament. Psychoanalytic theories of child development, as well as learning or behavioral theories, suggest that children's personalities are slowly shaped through their interactions with their parents and other significant people in their lives. A more integrated view would suggest that both genetics and experience play a role in personality development. Children may be born with certain personality traits, but there is both clinical and scientific evidence that the behavioral responses and their emotional reactions or vulnerabilities can be altered by their experiences with people and with their world, thus shaping their temperament or personality to some extent.

As a student of more behaviorally oriented psychologists, I was uncertain how this all actually worked until I had my first child. He seemed to have a personality right from the start. Clearly we shaped his behaviors by paying more attention or otherwise positively reinforcing the things we thought were cute or smart. And also, we shaped his behavior through correction, by ignoring things we did not want him to repeat, and sometimes by punishing "bad" behavior. Sure enough, it worked, just as my professors had said it would. Many of his actions and his attitudes are like my own and my husband's. I even hear myself in his sense of humor. I know that we have shaped his views of the world by showing him our view of the world. We have also shaped his view of himself by telling him that he is terrific since he was a newborn. As a teenager he has a positive self-image. Surely he was not a completely blank slate at birth for us to write out his life script or his personality. Yet I see myself in him every day. This boy is not a perfectionist. One look at his bedroom and you would instantly know what I mean.

The most fascinating thing happened when my second son was born. He looked like his brother, but he did not act like his brother. For the most part, we treated him the same way that we treated his older brother, used the same methods to shape his behavior. But this boy was different. My oldest son could sit in his high chair, happily playing with a mound of spaghetti, his face covered with sauce. My second son did not like being covered in goo. Instead, he would wipe his face and hands with a napkin as soon as he was old enough to figure out how to do it. The first time I saw this I was amazed that this kid of mine actually cared about neatness. As he got a little older he kept his room cleaner than his brother. When he learned to write he would erase and rewrite his homework until it was "perfect." This looked a lot like perfectionism to me. Was he born that way? It certainly seemed that he was different from the beginning.

Since I had treated many perfectionists by the time my second child started showing the characteristics of perfectionism, I knew the pros and cons of demanding perfection from yourself. I went out of my way to convince my son that he was "good enough," that his work was "good enough," that he was a terrific person regardless of his performance in school or on the soccer field or in the school band. I think he got the message that he is "good enough" and seems to have very good self-esteem (maybe a little too good at times). At the wise age of twelve he can tell me what projects need a great deal of attention and energy and which do not. I was helping him with his algebra homework a few nights ago. I asked him to rewrite the answer to the problem because I could not read it. I assumed that the teacher would not be able to read it either. The next day my son came home from school and told me that he had talked with his algebra teacher about his homework. He said to me, "Mom, Mrs. Foster said that neatness does not count in her class, so don't worry about it." I guess I had taught my son well. He is no longer overly concerned about neatness in his work. He puts more energy into getting the correct answer than in impressing his teacher with his neatness. So, am I saying that you are born a perfectionist? I think that some people are probably born more perfectionistic than others. However, their environments can influence the direction or shape that their perfectionism takes.

Environmental Influences

It often feels to many of us that we live in a society that demands perfection. Look at the pressure on Olympic athletes to score a perfect 10, for golfers to make the perfect shot, for obstetricians to deliver perfect babies or be sued (my husband's complaint). In raising my three boys I have seen many times where social pressures to be perfect were present. My fourth grader strives to get a perfect score not only on his spelling test, but also on the midweek pretest. That can get him out of taking the final test on Friday and assures that his name will appear on the weekly fourth-grade newsletter announcing him as a "Star Speller." My eleventh grader competes with his peers in band, where the difference between first chair and second or third chairs is a score of 98.5 versus 99 or 100 on a skill test. ("How did you do son?" "I totally messed up. I made one stupid mistake and the other guy did it perfectly. I hate him.") My eighth grader, the most naturally perfectionistic of the three, gets angry when his soccer teammates do not put out the effort to win that he consistently delivers. Coaches want to win. The kids want to win. It is a competitive world out there and my boys are right in the middle of it.

There are other types of societal pressures to be perfect. We hear in the various media that we should have a perfect body, perfect teeth, and perfect breath. There are many cosmetic companies, health programs, and plastic surgeons waiting to make us perfect. The images that we have begun to cherish are the lean, fit, tanned, muscular, shiny-haired beauties. The message we hear is that average is not OK. (I wish we could return to an era when wide hips and rounded tummies were admired. It used to be much easier to be perfect.)

Parental Influences

The evil of conditional praise.Many perfectionists, especially inwardly focused perfectionists, grew up with parents who either directly or indirectly communicated that they were not good enough. These were often confusing messages, where praise and criticism were given simultaneously. For example, "That was nice (praise), but I bet you could do better (you are not good enough now)." "Wow! (praise), six As and one B on your report card! You need to bring that B up to an A next time (near perfect was not enough)." "Your choir performance was lovely (praise), but that sound system is really poor. We could hardly hear you (it was not good enough)." Many prominent psychologists, such as David Burns, Ph.D., of the University of California, San Francisco, have found that the parents of perfectionists have difficulty rewarding their children's behaviors unconditionally and instead urge them to continue to try to do better. When their children make mistakes or perform below their standards, these parents feel bad and respond by showing disapproval and withdrawing their affection. Many of these children grew up still waiting for the day when they would receive unconditional praise from their parents, such as "nice job!" "the house looks great!" "that was a sensational meal!" or "you look so handsome!" Unconditional praise sends the message that "I approve of you or of what you have done without qualification." If only Mom and Dad thought so, maybe the pressure to be perfect would be off. Unfortunately, with the intention of continuing to motivate their children, these parents kept holding out the emotional carrot: "Just get it right this time and I will approve of you." Some psychological theories suggest that over time the child's need to please her parents becomes internalized, so that she no longer needs to please her parents; she now demands perfection from herself.

When June was a little girl, one of her chores was to sweep the front porch. Tidiness inside the house as well as outside was important to June's mother. June was little and maneuvering that big broom was not easy. Her mother would watch her from the living room window and smile with delight. ("She is so precious. Look at her push that big broom. She is trying so hard.") June's mom thought that it was important for June to help out around the house just like her big sisters. When June finished her chore, her mother would pat her on the head, thank her for doing such a good job, and send her off to play. What she did not know was that as June ran off into the yard she would always look back and see her mother sweeping the porch again, just as June had done. At first, June thought it was peculiar, but later came to realize that her mother was redoing her chore because June had not done a good enough job. The unspoken message was "that was good June, but not good enough for me." June tried harder each time not to miss any of the dirt on the front porch, but no matter how great her effort, Mom would always have to redo her work. June's mother was a perfectionist. For her there was a right way to do a job. She knew that June was doing her best, so she did not openly criticize her for missing spots on the porch. She simply fixed it herself, no harm, no foul.

This might seem like a relatively minor event, but for many people it represents a pattern of interaction between themselves and their parents that sends a mixed message that they were good, but not good enough. Enough direct or subtle messages like this over the years and you will come to believe it.

A tough act to follow.Having a parent who is a superstar in some way also leads children to feel that they will never be good enough. I am not just talking about celebrities who have made it big. I am talking about parents who are either outstanding people or who have done outstanding things in their life. A child who watches her parent excel might try to imagine achieving similar things. From a kid's perspective this looks too hard: "There is no way I could ever be like him." This can also occur when the superstar is an older brother or sister.

Some children of superstar parents grow up thinking that their parents are perfect, which is, of course, a very unrealistic view of adults. They do not see their parents exhausted, fall apart, lose their temper, act like jerks, misbehave, or forget things. Many parents hide their mistakes from their children, so that all they see is the final product. This is especially true of perfectionist parents, who believe that their imperfections or mistakes are unacceptable. The result is that on the surface these parents seem to never make a mistake. They always have the answers, do well, make good choices, take good care of themselves, and so on. The child, on the other hand, sees him- or herself make mistakes all the time. Therefore, the child concludes that she could never be as good as Mom or Dad. So why try?

By watching their perfectionist parents some kids learn to behave in ways that could be considered perfectionistic, which psychologists call learning through modeling. As children they learn to attend to details, keep their environments neat, be well groomed, and follow the rules. They learn that there is a right way and a wrong way to do things, and they learn that persistence is valued. Even though they think they will never be good enough, they have to keep trying. It would not be right to give up. Mom and Dad never gave up.

"I'm just trying to protect you."Terry's mom, Aurora, was an attractive woman. She had a lovely figure, though she had to work very hard to keep it. She had long brown hair that eventually turned to a silvery gray. When she was a young girl she had been criticized for her skinny legs, her pale skin, her straight hair, and her small eyes. This hurt Aurora's feelings a great deal. Assuring her that she was as beautiful as the other girls, Aurora's mother urged her to ignore the pettiness of her peers. However, Aurora thought that her mother did not really take her concerns seriously. "She just says that because she loves me." So Aurora vowed to pay closer attention to her own daughter's appearance so that people would not criticize her. When Terry was born, Aurora was concerned that Terry was too skinny and had little eyes like her own. She was otherwise a wonderful baby and Aurora loved her very much. When Terry entered elementary school, Aurora helped her choose clothing that complimented her figure and coloring. She chose a hairstyle that made Terry's straight hair look stylish. When Terry was a teenager her mother helped her to apply eye makeup in a way that enlarged her eyes. When Terry would come down for breakfast before school her mother would look her over and suggest alternative clothes that would better compliment her figure. Terry had not yet developed womanly curves as had her girlfriends, and Aurora did not want Terry to wear clothes that drew attention to her "underdevelopment." Aurora would tell Terry in her own way that it was OK to not have a perfect body or face as long as you learned ways to compensate for those weaknesses. Terry appreciated her mother's attention to her appearance on the one hand and resented her on the other. If Terry complained, "I look fine mom," her mother would say, "I'm just trying to protect you." However, the message that consistently came through was "Not only do other people think you are not good enough as you are, I do not think you are good enough either. You are full of imperfections and it is important to hide them from those who would hurt you because of them." Aurora never really explained to Terry why it was important to be accepted by others and why criticism had to be avoided. Over time Terry merged her mother's values and her own doubts about her beauty in adulthood to hide her weaknesses. Although Terry could never meet her mother's expectations of womanly beauty, she had a cute figure and was very pretty. Despite this, Terry continued to look for her own imperfections and hide them from others. During their marriage, her husband, Steve, would make fun of Terry's insistence on looking good before she let anyone see her. He told her that she was beautiful and thought it ridiculous that she had to paint on her face before she would even eat breakfast. She did not believe him. Sadly, Steve's honest admiration could not undo a lifetime of her mother's powerful message that she would never be good enough.

Seeking control over chaos.Some perfectionists tell stories of chaotic childhoods where they never seemed to have control over their lives. Marital breakups, relocations, financial crises, illnesses, and other hardships created an environment of instability. One of the ways in which these people got some sense of order in their otherwise disordered lives was to try to fix things over which they had some control, such as making their immediate home or school environments neat and orderly. This might include keeping their rooms neat and tidy, working exceptionally hard on schoolwork, or attempting to control their younger brothers and sisters. This strategy may have been adaptive in that it helped them to cope with the uncertainty, unpredictability, and chaos in their home lives. As adults, however, when their lives were no longer in flux, they may have continued to work hard to maintain control. This symptom of perfectionism, which was at one point adaptive, later became problematic in various ways.

WHAT KEEPS IT GOING?

So if perfectionism can cause so much trouble, what keeps it going? The simplest answer is that there is considerable reinforcement for doing things perfectly. Reinforcement can come from you or it can come from others. There are two kinds of self-reinforcement. If you are fearful that you will be criticized, ridiculed, humiliated, or otherwise punished for performing less than perfectly, doing the job "just right" lowers your anxiety and keeps those bad things from happening. This is called negative reinforcement.

A second type is positive reinforcement, such as self-approval or a sense of pleasure or personal satisfaction for doing a great job. In fact, it is possible to experience both positive and negative reinforcement at the same time. Usually, perfectionists are more aware of their sense of satisfaction for a job well done than their success at avoiding punishment or rejection.

Positive reinforcement can come from other people as well. Praise is a positive reinforcer that is validating, boosts self-esteem, makes you feel accepted, and confirms that you are a worthwhile individual. We learn early in life that other people seem to value and often will reward perfection. Schoolteachers give gold stars, praise, and provide special rewards to the students who get 100 percent correct on a test. There is c

Excerpted from Never Good Enough: How to Use Perfectionism to Your Advantage Without Letting It Ruin Your Life by Monica Ramirez Basco
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