When it comes to your body, the trait can bring profits and peril
Article Source: msnbc.com
from:msnbc.comBeing a perfectionist can take toll on health
Seeded on Mon Jul 12, 2010 9:06 AM EDT (msnbc.com)
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I believe myself to be a perfectionist, particularly the self-imposed variety. I can attest that it does have an effect on your quality of life. Chronic panic and anxiety plague you everyday. If someone in your social world disagrees with you and lets you know about it, you feel like they hate you. It's like your self-esteem and every good thing you ever did is erased by the one mistake or humiliating moment.
In dealing with this perfectionism for more than 30 years, I can only tell you this my fellow perfectionist friends: It's OK. You are a marvelous creation of God. Your mistakes have occurred on purpose and for a reason. The reason is to develop your character and make you the person God intended you to be. Don't lose heart and feel that you are a burden on others. You are a valuable part of their lives. When you make a mistake, ask the person and God for forgiveness. It helps me to know that to worry is disrespect to the Lord, for he is in control. It helps to know that my value in Him makes it a crime for anyone (especially me) to doubt the worth of myself or existence. It also helps to know that by following God and trusting Him, he will make your paths straight, and show you that the mistakes, difficult times, and trials are specs of sand that make up the beautiful mural of of your life
I too am a perfectionist and totally agree with you on all points you made, especially the chronic pain and anxiety. I had to teach myself to "let go and let God" when it came to my perfectionism. It got to the point where I dreaded leaving my home for fear I would screw up and end up berating myself endlessly, sometimes to the point of having panic attacks. Add to that being analytical also and it was a recipe for disaster because I would play any mistakes I made over and over and over again in my mind only making myself more miserable. The addict has the Serenity prayer, but my motto is, "I am a human being and I was made imperfect as all human beings are." I have four children and two are perfectionists. When I noticed this trait in them also I worked very hard teaching them that it's okay to make mistakes, that mistakes are part of the learning process, and that there was only one perfect person ever, Jesus and we are not him.
This is denial. With all due respect, you have swept your perfectionist problems under the rug. By calling it "disrespect to god" simply perpetuates more self-abuse and guilt for hurting god.
"he" has not made my perfectionist tendecies better for me; I have - with good old-fashioned hard work. Pushing the god button, to me, is the same as taking a Xanax or a stiff drink. The problems are still there when the drug wears off.
Great comment!
He may have put it on his deity-of-choice and you may have relied on your can-do-attitude, but it seems you guys both got similar results.
I don't see an issue.
*shrug*
Great quote!
First of all let me give a bold statement here. Every human being is made to be perfect. It is his/her thinking that creates the imperfections.
The authors of this article say there is a "socially-imposed" perfectionism, and "self-imposed" perfectionism, there is no difference between the two until you actually "think" there is a difference. Even in the case of "socially-imposed" perfectionism, finally it is up to you what you think of your self. Do not let others or anybody guide the way you should think or lead your lives.
Another point this article talks about is Stress. Again if you already know that you are made to be perfect and your thinking and actions are aligned towards it , there will be no thoughts that will cause stress to you. Stress comes from negative thoughts, thoughts/fear of imperfection-ism. Once you defeat those thoughts nothing is impossible.
Everything you see in this world is a precipitation of a "thought" or "thoughts". Everyday our body recreates millions of cells and it is the human brain has a huge part to play when creating these cells. Diseases, ailments and imperfections come from your thoughts not from your society.
Science and research just shows us the results of what the current state is. Even this paper for that matter shows good research, I don't disagree with it but if we think of it, it is just the "result" not the norm. All the people who have taken the survey for this research have the same fundamental issue, their thinking is influenced by the external factors and hence the results.
If we researched say 500 people who were told to think only "positive" thoughts and they where told that they are already "perfect" and their perfect state cannot be disturbed unless they have negative thoughts, then I will bet the results will be different.
Humans are 100% created by their environment (genetic heritage is a part of ones environment). As such all human behavior is reactive - our behavior is an interaction with our current perceived environment and our memories of dealing with similar situations. This fact alone disproves the Secret and other Calvinistic philosophies. No one is in control of their destiny - we only have homeostatic abilities which lead us to learn from experience and apply that learning to future events. This ability is sometimes mistakenly called free will. In reality, there is no such thing as free will - we are only doing what we were trained to do. Saik here has restated the basic tenets of attraction theory. It is not true.
Bob, you yourself are saying that "our behavior is an interaction with our current perceived environment" Where does perception come from ? Your thoughts are perceptions. If everybody is reactive, then we would never have known Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. They would all be reacting to what their neighbors did and do the same thing. There would be no "out of the box" thinking, there would be no inventions, humans would have never evolved if we were not creative rather than reactive.
while you may be right that the "thoughts" are causing the issues, you cannot reasonably believe that people who have had years of distorted thinking patterns can just decide to think positivly and go on the live perfectly happily. In order to do what you are suggesting, most people would need years of cognitive therapy, and even with that, most people have negative thoughts once in a while. If i were told to think just happy thoughts, I may try, but inevitably I would go back to the thinking pattern I had before
IMHO this article is an about an excuse for not thriving for perfection. If you’re going to do a job why not do it right? Anyone can do a halfa$$ job! Of course if you aren’t able to master the task stress could be a problem, therefore you’re not going to be a perfectionist no matter how much you try. I don’t think doing something right is going to cause health problems but I can see how doing a sloppy job could be terminal. We need more people motivated for perfection not less.
That would be ..."striving for"... not ..."thriving for"... perfection, so I think I can safely say that you are not a perfectionist. I'm not either. Unless you've had experience with an OCD type of perfectionism, you really have no idea what this article is talking about.
I know, it was too late to change it but I didn't hyperventilate.
What if we humans strove for excellence instead of perfection? looked upon ourselves and others with kindness, and encouragement? pursued a life of learning, and appreciation, toward achieving our best in all things? saw and celebrated the divine spark in each living being? Namaste.
Why strive for perfection. You are perfect just the way you are. Tha is not to say always do your best. Always strive to improve. But don't judge yourself. The ball is still in motion. Change is the essential element of all experience. Who knows what tommorrow will bring.
Now the hard part.... Taking my own advice!!!
Really, Brian, perfectionists make mistakes, too. Whether DWF is one or not can't, nor should it, be judged by a single error.
The real clue to whether or not someone is a perfectionist is not if they make an error but how they react when they do make an error. In the extreme, perfectionism can keep one from attempting things, even harmless, inconsequential things for the fear of not doing it correctly.
Just the continual drive to strive for the self imposed variety of perfectionism is a creator of stress and anxierty. This is not the same as having the goal of the"job well done". This striving for perfection becomes almost an obsession to accomplish the task perfectly without any error or shortcoming whatsoever.
Slow news day..
you forgot to include the idiot political activists that spend every moment of their lives striving for 'perfection in the USA'...they seriosuly need a break too...
My mother was such a perfectionist and lived to be 92 yrs.old. She enherited diabetes from one of her parents, At the end of her life, she did not needed any medication to control her disease. I excelled in college with highest grades and graduated as a nurse but during my time of my profession I did not take of my myself, I was most preoccupied with the well being of my pacients. I ended up with diabetes out of control and nerve damaged in my shoulders and both hands to the point of losing function on both hands, also having glaucoma on both eyes. I have to learn to ease up, and take things as they come. I am 62 yrs. old, my health is ruined.
Most perfectionists have a "god" complex in that they see themselves as superior to others and have an elitist attitude. These are the people who are overly ambitious, refuse to follow when they are incapable of leading but insist on being in charge. They are usually bipolar and not stabilized because they don't just believe in god they see themselves as god, whether they will admit it or not. They are irritating and are hardly an asset, yet they have this grandiose sense of self. To strive for perfection is being the best you can be at that moment but you don't beat yourself up if don't meet that goal you just keep working on it. The delusional see that as failure I think those are people make everyone around them irritated and exasperated.
well, while there are some like that, there are also the perfectionists that will never try to be in charge because they know that they will make mistakes and think that they failed. Plenty of perfectionists have low self esteem rather than a superiority complex. Especially the socially driven ones. They believe that nobody will ever like them unless they are perfect. if they make mistakes, they come to believe that they are not worthy of other people liking them
I am unstoppably wondering at a quest for perfectionism heralded around, while depression, anxiety and fears followed increasingly, logically and customarily, as an average-intelligent could understand from this plain-English bold publication.
I used to think I was a perfectionist. I was always very competitive, and had an innate desire to be the best in every single endeavor. I was mistaken-I was just driven and strived for the best.
I married a beautiful gal that I thought was perfect! Turns out she was a full blown perfectionist. I didn't even know who she was until about six weeks into our marriage. She kept her true feelings, and thoughts to herself for fear of being seen as imperfect. People aren't perfectionists or have never lived with someone who is don't really understand the extremity of this flaw.
She is incapable of keeping a job because she can't take criticism (help) and thinks if you disagree with her you hate her and think she is stupid. She doesn't have any friends. Our home life is awful. No matter how much I do it is never done right or isn't good enough. (I work 2 jobs, making 100k+ do all the housework, cleaning, cooking, yard, finances, etc.) She won't try anything new because of a fear of failure. She has physically debilitating anxiety, and depression that follows the guilt of not being perfect. She has a hard time sleeping because she "can't turn her brain off".
It is a horrible horrible condition that is very misunderstood and affects everyone who comes in contact with someone with such and obsessive mindframe. Negativity all the time. There needs to be more understanding and more awareness. Our culture is partially to blame... Failure is OK. we learn more through failing than we do from succeeding. We need to feel secure enough to branch out and experience new things.
I'm never make mistakes. On the single occasion, when I thought I'd made a mistake ... I was wrong.