Note to self: Your perfectionism is showing…
I’ve been potty training my toddler, and I’ll be honest: I wasn’t ready. Things are turning a corner, but let’s just say there’s been a lot more cortisol rattling around in my body. It wasn’t just the act of teaching my strong-willed 2.5 year old something new that caused the stress - my thoughts about the whole situation are what made it spiral. A truly perfect storm.
When I feel super stressed, I sometimes revert to my tried and true coping strategies, even - and maybe especially - the ones I thought I’d ditched for good. My drug of choice has often been perfectionism, along with its friends anxiety and catastrophizing. They help me retain the illusion of control when things feel really wonky. Perfectionism tells us that things are either good or bad, right or wrong, going well or decidedly going terribly. This makes it the nemesis of little people doing the messy (pun intended) work of figuring out how to be human, but maybe more importantly, the nemesis of adults also trying to figure out how to grow as a human.
When I feel myself sinking into a perfectionistic black hole (and I finally notice I’m here), my thoughts usually spiral into anger - at myself. “How could I be so weak? Why am I letting this stress own me? What’s wrong with me - have I learned nothing? I’m back at square one!!”
Not surprisingly, that kind of talk sounds a lot like - you guessed it - perfectionism. After years of working to move perfectionism farther and farther to the back of my emotional closet, it still pops out to say hello when I’m losing my grip, as an invitation to keep building the muscle it takes to try to be with whatever is hard, in ways that are softer, more nuanced, more compassionate, and more real. I’m glad it does, because once I’ve realized the lesson, I can put it back in the closet, knowing that it will show up again when I need that particular workout again. I - and my toddler - are grateful for the reminder that we are human. Messy. Nonlinear. In process. Imperfect.
