“If I don’t try, she thinks to herself, I won’t fail. In the perverse logic of the Perfectionist, where only outcomes matter, avoiding failure by avoiding work itself makes a certain kind of sense.”
I like lists. They keep me on task. My daily and weekly to-do lists are often a success and keep me focused. This is counter to my yearly to-do lists.
At the start of many years, I begin to craft my ‘project for the year.’ If you read my yearly project lists, you’ll see that I’ve been ambitious. Everything from write a book about Toronto’s street youth (2000) to start a peace organization (2004). There’s been smaller one’s like start a disability arts company (2006) to write a play for a fringe festival (2010). If I were to review all these annual projects, I would see that most did not occur. I drafted some thoughts down, but few went further than that.
When I was reading The Pursuit of Perfect by Tal Ben Shahar and came across the quote, “If I don’t try, she thinks to herself, I won’t fail. In the perverse logic of the Perfectionist, where only outcomes matter, avoiding failure by avoiding work itself makes a certain kind of sense,” I had two realizations. First, shit, I am a perfectionist. Second, its pursuit has led to a lot of good intention, but little action.
My perfectionism stopped me from doing many things out of fear of being not perfect! Which is silly, because I easily accept many of my imperfections. What I hadn’t readily accepted until pointed out by Dr. Shahar is that my unconscious strive for perfection had prevented me from often trying things out.
When I take myself back to Jay in 2004, I see why I wanted to start a peaceful movement. Wars were occurring, genocides were being ignored, direct attacks on my people (LGBT folks) were being waged, and it all felt very overwhelming. I wanted to make a difference. I went global. Gather up friends and family that wanted to make a change and do it! I, then, talked myself out of going global.
I rationalized that there’s issues occurring in my, then, hometown of Toronto. There’s poverty, homelessness, child abuse, right here instead out of out there that can be addressed. I, then, talked myself out of addressing major issues and said ‘What about small change? Wouldn’t that be easier?’ I visualized that the group would start strong. First month, tons of enthusiasm. Next month, not so much. There’d be conflict over which small change to tackle. Quickly the hype of the idea would fade to nothing and it would all be for nought. So instead of creating small change, I created no change. I justified in my head that it wasn’t worth the effort.
I have to reflect back that my hunt for perfectionism is what was truly behind that decision. I didn’t want others to view me as a failure and I didn’t want to fail either.
My perfectionism hasn’t always held me back. I would’ve never started that disability arts company, quit my job for grad school, ran a family farm in rural Australia, and founded a global men’s meditation group, if I always strove to be perfect. These one’s I let my need to be of service push ahead of any fears of failure. I wanted to create a space where artists with a disability could receive training and get the spotlight on stage. It could’ve easily been a failure, but the potential for success outshone the perfectionism. During the pandemic, I was feeling useless and thought that creating a little space for others to meditate with one another online could be my contribution.
Now that I’m aware of what holds me back (overwhelming feelings of failure) and what helps me to overcome it (being of service), I’m much more able to focus my annual projects around this.
How about you? What will you do when you realise that, “If I don’t try, she thinks to herself, I won’t fail. In the perverse logic of the Perfectionist, where only outcomes matter, avoiding failure by avoiding work itself makes a certain kind of sense.” What aspects of your life are you not pursuing out of a fear of failure?
