#healing perfectionism

[spiraeaherbs]

Navigating The Waters of Perfectionism

Navigating The Waters of Perfectionism

There is nothing like the abundance and dare I say, gluttony, of the holiday season to force you to bump up against your current beliefs systems.  Temptations abound and the stories that hold me back rear their ugly heads. One of the deepest challenges I have to navigate in this life has been my propensity towards perfectionism. I have been through may indurations of this story in my lifetime. In…

[girl-that-writes]

It just breaks my heart so much when I see someone burning themselves out to try to become perfect. Nothing in this world has ever been perfect, nor will it ever be. If things could ever be perfect, evolution would have just stopped at some point, don't you think?

[elizakai]

experimenting in a new sketchbook

[thepeacefulgarden]

[furiousgoldfish]

I hear a lot of 'Don't give up, keep trying, you'll get there!' when people mention some of their worst struggles, but you know, it's okay to give up. If something is making you feel awful about yourself, it's stressing you out to the point where you lose your life quality over it, if you're identifying your entire value over how it goes, if you're experiencing crushing anxiety over it, if you're starting to feel suicidal over it, it's okay to give up. You are worth more than that thing that is stressing you out.

I can't think of anything that is worth bearing so much pain for. What in life is worth losing your will to live? We humans don't need to spend our life struggling so badly. We need comfort, feeling good about ourselves, feeling worthy, feeling safe, and cozy, and peaceful, and happy. If trying desperately hard at something is taking this away from you, it might not be worth it. Finding new ways to experience calm and comfort, that could be a better focus.

We're not alive only to accomplish. We can exist just to find ways to feel good. Even if it's something that people wouldn't usually do, even if you feel calmer and better when alone, when not accomplishing anything, when you're removed from any stress or competition, when you're just you and there's nothing to compare yourself to. You can do that. There's nobody worthy of judging you for that.

[warm-autumn-evenings]

So often I forget that finding my way back to love will take time. Healing will take time. I expect myself to change thought patterns and behavioural patterns immediately. This is not possible. It will take time and I deserve to take that time.

[yourhealingjournal]

sometimes you really do have to let go what you want to do at least for the moment, not because you don’t deserve it or you are not allowed to have it, but because you have too much on your plate & your peace is more worth keeping than the overwhelm of achieving everything now.

[akindplace]

You don’t have to be perfect all the time to be worthy of love - you don’t have to earn it in a way that contradicts your own humanity. I’m sorry someone made you feel that way, like you can never accomplish anything unless you are perfect in every way, that you must alway have your guard up and walk on eggshells to please everyone around you so they would deem you worthy of success, of respect, of love, of companionship.

When those basic needs are neglected, you start to believe you haven’t done enough to earn them, and you fall into a spiral trying to please someone who can’t be pleased. But I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to earn these things in the first place, that being imperfect doesn’t make you an unacceptable and inadequate person, it doesn’t make you unlovable. The person who treated you this way was never deserving of your own love, of your desperate attempts to please them. It’s on them, not on you.

The expectations they put on you were so unreachable for any human being, and you were deemed to fail, but not because you were always a failure. They were always so demanding that no one, not even themselves, could reach the desired level of perfection and pleasing behavior they asked of you. It was absolutely unfair for them to do so. And most of all, none of this was your fault. It’s not your behavior that was unacceptable - it was theirs.

You’re not unlovable. And even if their voice echoes through your head a lot repeating those awful things they made you believe about your own worth, I hope you can try to contradict them. You are finding your own voice now, one that tells you that you’re still worthy of love because you’re a human being, just like everyone else, and every person deserves respect and kindness. And slowly, hopefully, we can shift that belief in our inadequacy into one that is kinder and more confident in who we are, because even with all our flaws, we’re not unworthy of love.

[stygiusfic]

a few weeks ago I picked up my tablet for the first time in many long years to make this.

the meme that best represents my default durge's emotional journey in early act 3.

tfw you're obsessed with your hot githyanki gf but she won't take over the world with you, she just cares about freeing Orpheus, which is exactly the last thing you need anyone to do for your evil plan to work... but the more she refuses to fall in line the more attractive she becomes, because she has the power to resist what you do not

[lousydrawingsforgoodpeople]

[loveyourlovelysoul]

Sometimes we wait for something to be perfect or we call us perfectionists, but in reality we are just fearing being judged, failing, feeling not at ease or been perceived as not good enough (very likely cause in your childhood or past, we had to overwork or do something "special" in order to be praised by our caregivers or authority figures -in school too). So yeah, more often than not perfectionism is a mask: a sign of insecurity, a search for external validation about things we actually don't ever feel satisfied about (and therefore unsafe). And this need only creates an endless cycle of uneasiness, or better, feeling threatened in our nervous system.

Perfectionism wants us to believe we actually hold control of something that in reality we cannot control: others' judgement (which often doesn't even depends on us directly). And this constant threat and need to be better and to push harder, only produces even more distress in our mind and body too, all of which may create space for some chronic conditions as well.

The only way to fight with this, is to accept that nobody is really perfect, that we're all our own type of perfect and no matter what standards we set to achieve, not everyone will like us anyway. So, next time we try to get more from ourself and wait for things to be really perfect (like 200% perfect), never really taking a leap because we're not secure of the result, we may try to take a breath and find a compromise between what we can humanly do at this time and the standards we want to achieve (which we may even reach one day with practice -trying more and failing more-, time, patience... who knows).

Remember that sometimes being messy, imperfect but true to ourselves, accepting and acknowledging our limits and knowing we've done our best anyway, is the first step to self awareness and to help ourselves ease the effects that that continue search for a fake perfection produces in us.

[safe-haven-safe-place]

[audreyrose7]

I feel incredibly called out 😅

[serenityquest]

[thepeacefulgarden]

You deserve happiness. You deserve safety and security. You deserve healthy relationships. You deserve support. You deserve love of all kinds, from yourself and others. You deserve to feel good. You deserve a job or career that's satisfying, and that doesn't make you dread going in every day. You deserve rest. You deserve nourishment. You deserve the same love and care you so freely give to other people. You deserve to be treated with respect and dignity. You deserve to feel at home in your body. You deserve credit for your small wins as well as your big ones. You deserve to honor your progress. You deserve time for you. You deserve to forgive yourself for your mistakes. You deserve to learn and grow. And you deserve these things no matter what.

[zeestie]

ᥫ᭡.dearest diary,

Okay, smth I wanna let go off is this idea that I gotta be good at things or that I gotta do smth in order to feel deserving of what I want.

I will probably need to learn this lesson again but really, I don't need an excuse to ask for what I want. I don't need to rationalise it. I don't need to have a strong case for it. hell, I don't even need to ask (or beg). I just receive.

I really wanna let go off this proving, desperate energy & & allow things to just be for now... & forever too. I don't wanna chase or anticipate people's reactions anymore. I wanna live my life according to my rules.

I think I am a very logical and reasonable person, so why not just let that shine through in my relationships with others and allow for my needs, wants, and opinions to be known?

I don't wanna live in fear. I don't wanna stay in these rigid boundaries that feel so restrictive. & why should I? the only thing holding me back is my own self. I get to decide to step away from all of this and just be.

I am mature. I am reasonable. therefore, I deserve to have a say. this is my life after all. why can't I let myself decide? why am I letting society decide for me?

yk I really deserve a f*ckin' break sometimes. I really don't want the idea of what "needs" to be done to hold me down any more, so I release it.

I release the need to be good. I release the need to be right. I release the need to be comfortable: I release my fear of uncertain conversations and the unpleasant feelings that could arise as a result. I release all other perceptions about me that don't serve me.

I'm never putting myself down for what I think the other person will approve of. I am my own validation. I am willing to stand firm for what I think cos ik I deserve all the support in what I want.

ᥫ᭡˚₊