Breaking Up With Perfectionism

A marriage not made in heaven: burnout and perfectionism. When our perfectionistic beliefs and behaviours have hijacked us for an extended period, we are bound to burn out. I should know. My perfectionism contributed to my burnout in February 2021 after many years of working in the mental health field, and the therapy that followed involved breaking up with my inner perfectionist.

Since moving back to my career as a psychologist and devoting my practice to helping others through burnout, I have seen perfectionism wreak havoc on others’ mental health. I want to share with you today the steps that I used, and that I now teach clients, to break up with perfectionism. But first, let’s get clear on what perfectionism and burnout are.

Perfectionism is a combination of beliefs and behaviours that makes humans vulnerable to poor mental health and mental illnesses. Contrary to popular belief, perfectionism isn’t about wanting everything to be 100%. I adopt the Centre for Clinical Intervention's (2019) classification of perfectionism, which includes:

1. Unrelenting standards — even when you have met your goal, there is no time for rest or celebration. It is on to the next thing or what you can improve on. There is no coming up for air.
2. High expectations — the standards put on yourself are often not in line with what is humanely possible. Your current energy levels or what is happening around you (i.e., other stressors) are usually not considered.
3. Self-worth based only on achievements — you only deem yourself worthy as a human being if you are meeting your goals, and if you are not, you define yourself as a failure.

It is no wonder that people with perfectionism find themselves burnt out. Now, onto burnout.

I adopt the most widely accepted classification of burnout from Maslach and Leiter (2016): Burnout is a psychological syndrome resulting from ongoing interpersonal stressors from the work environment, compounded by non-work stressors. Symptoms and impacts include:

1. Emotional exhaustion: A feeling of mind, body, and soul fatigue.
2. Cynicism and depersonalisation: Where one is usually not, they find themselves increasingly pessimistic about their work role and may even feel detached from their work.
3. Low professional efficacy or sense of achievement: One may have increasing self-doubt about their capacity to do their profession when they usually feel confident. They may even feel a sense of not getting anywhere with their work.

The good news is that if you find yourself in this marriage and not liking it at all (who would), you can break up with perfectionism. It isn’t a fixed state! Here’s how to do it:

Step 1: Get to know your perfectionism. Be mindful, that is, curious and present with it. Learn as much about it as you can. Do not judge or try to evaluate it. Get to know it. Ask questions, such as:

1. What triggers it (e.g., work tasks)? When does it show up?
2. What kinds of thoughts/beliefs does it have? Often, the thoughts of the perfectionist start with "I should…." or "I must….." or have the undertones of "failure" or "not good enough."
3. What feelings come with it (e.g., fear, anxiety, stress, etc.)?
4. What behaviours do I do when it is around (e.g., bring work home to finish)?

Step 2: Know the perfectionist’s history. Where did the perfectionism come from? How did it serve you in the past? My perfectionism extended from a combination of modelling from my father and the focus on achievement in the systems I was exposed to growing up (e.g., school). It helped me to grow and achieve as a person. It gave me a sense of value and worthiness. It also gave me cycles of anxiety and depression, as well as burnout.

Perfectionism Essential Reads

Choose to Be Present Rather Than Perfect

Do You Suffer From Perfectionism or Procrastination?

Step 3: Explore the impacts. Draw two columns — positive and negative effects of perfectionism and write these down. Do the negatives outweigh the positives?

Step 4: Turn the "should and must" thoughts from Step 1 into a choice. The "shoulds" and "musts" of perfectionism are rigid in their expectations of us and do not allow for any humanness of making a mistake, of not knowing something, or of needing time to learn and develop. Write down your "shoulds" and "musts," then change them into a choice. For example, change "I should be able to answer every question my client has about something" into "I will do my best to answer their questions, but when I don’t know, I will follow up with them and send an email with the answer."

Step 5: Choose one of the actions from Step 1 to work on changing. Choose to reduce this perfectionist behaviour. Depending on how entrenched and frequent it is, you may need to take this in small, manageable steps. Start with the easiest of perfectionist behaviours first and work up to the hardest.

Step 6: Identify the values behind your actions. With the new non-perfectionist behaviour, ask yourself, "What is rich, meaningful, or purposeful about this?" Values will help you stay motivated to engage in this new behaviour when difficult thoughts, feelings, or sensations arise. The values behind reducing my perfectionist behaviours were my well-being, family, and friends. All three were suffering as a result of my perfectionistic beliefs and behaviours.

Step 7: Ground yourself. There will be times throughout this process when you experience discomfort with the change. This is not a sign that letting go of perfectionistic behaviours is wrong. It takes a while for humans to adjust to a new behaviour, and the mind and body don’t like it at first. This is where you can engage in actions that help regulate you, like breath, movement, nature, and engaging your senses.

There you have it. I hope this helps. Please seek support from others, including friends and professionals if you find breaking up with perfectionism hard. And know that it is okay if you do. I did.

Take care of you.