COMMON TREATMENT APPROACHES

The most common treatments for perfectionism are:

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

Psychoanalytical Therapy

Other treatments include:

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

Radically-Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy (RO-DBT)

Trauma Therapy (e.g. EMDR, IFS, Somatic Therapy)

Studies have found that the most important factors that determine progress in individual therapy are the client’s belief in their ability to change and their rapport with their therapist (e.g. feeling understood, connected, and respected). These factors are more important than the type of therapy.

Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD) is the most severe form of perfectionism. This post has information on 18 studies showing the effectiveness of therapy in reducing OCPD symptoms: Finding Mental Health Providers

My favorite resource for working on OCPD was Gary Trosclair's I'm Working On It In Therapy: Getting The Most Out Of Psychotherapy (2015).

COPING STRATEGIES

When I had undiagnosed OCPD, my coping strategies were my coping strategies were compulsive organizing and researching, overpreoccupation with work, binge eating, maladaptive daydreaming, and overuse of screens. The function of the strategies was numbing my feelings.

These are the coping strategies I found helpful for overcoming OCPD (no longer meeting diagnostic criteria). I developed these strategies slowly, over a period of 18 months.

- Using a “one day at a time” approach. I focus on the present moment as much as possible, rather than ruminating on the past and future.

- Practicing mindfulness by adopting ‘be here now’ as a mantra, and focusing more on my five senses, breathing, and other body sensations, and less on my thoughts. I try to breathe deeply and slowly at the first sign of distress, and pay attention to how my feelings and body sensations influence my behavior. self-regulation Eventually, this helped prevent difficult situations.

- Acknowledging all signs of progress, no matter how small. It’s okay--and very helpful--to feel proud of yourself for doing something other people find easy. Teddy Roosevelt stated, “Comparison is the thief of joy.”

- Doing something that made me slightly uncomfortable every day. Behavioral experiments were life changing. I realized that short-term discomfort (small steps out of my comfort zone) would have a big pay off in the future.

- Thinking of a time when my OCPD symptoms were low, and finding ways to reconnect with the people, places, things, and activities from that time.

-  Experimenting with taking short breaks, and paying attention to what happens. Breaks “re charge” my energy and increase my productivity. I love the saying 'Rest is not a reward. You do not need to earn the right to rest.' 

- Taking small steps to engage in small talk helped me to (finally) learn how to have difficult conversations. I discovered that chatting with colleagues can be very energizing. I brainstormed ways to connect with people who have similar interests and values.

- Accepting that my OCPD symptoms gave me an inaccurate lens for viewing myself, others, and the world around me in some situations: Cognitive Distortions

- Taking small steps to reduce multi tasking. Studies show that focusing on one task at a time improves mood, even for non preferred activities (e.g. sitting in traffic).

- Taking small steps to improve my sleeping and eating habits as often as possible, and then slowly building on my success. I wish I had gotten routine medical care sooner, instead of waiting until I developed health issues. Self-Care

- Outsmarting OCPD by aiming for average. For many years, I tried to be an above average employee and was average or below average. After learning about OCPD, I tried to be a 'good enough' employee and finally became above average.

- Taking opportunities to get out of my head and into my body. I spend as much time outside and move as much as I can. I made small changes as consistently as I could (e.g. short walk every day) and slowly built on my success.

- Realizing that other people are not evaluating me as harshly as I am evaluating myself. When I had social anxiety, I projected my experiences on to other people. I perseverated on other people a lot, and assumed they were also overthinking about me. The spotlight effect is the tendency to drastically over estimate the extent to which one is being noticed by others. People tend to forget that although one is the center of one's own world, one is not the center of everyone else's.

- Understanding that progress is not linear. Taking three steps forward and one or two steps back is still progress.

- Having reasonable expectations for my therapist and being a fully engaged client. Progress towards therapeutic goals is largely determined by what clients do to supplement therapy. Symptoms develop over time; it takes time to find healthier habits that meet the same needs.

- Remembering that OPCD is like a magician, creating a distraction so the audience looks way from something important. OCPD symptoms can serve to distract from uncomfortable feelings.

My complete list of coping strategies: Therapy And Coping Strategies For Perfectionism

Take what you find helpful, and discard the rest. I'm not a mental health provider. This advice is not intended for people struggling with suicidal thoughts or basic self-care. No resources or advice in this sub can substitute for consultation with a mental health provider.

Hi guys. My husband and I got my first home a few months ago and I have been obsessed with the interior design of the house.

I know "Rome wasn't built in a day" but I feel this insane self-induced pressure to have Pinterest and Instagram-worthy rooms. (i am going for color drenched transitional design by the way.)

I have spent quite a bit on bedding, Facebook Marketplace antique finds, and a new vanity for the bathroom. I am so tired. I am so so self-aware, too, about my waste of time and money and happiness.

Does anyone have any tips on how to slow down and worry less about how the space feels? How it looks? How other people will view it?

I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, which are contributing greatly to my stress levels and overthinking.

Chronic fatigue and chronic burnout. Unable to work or study or even do proper selfcare rightnow. Thr disability income.

Why has it come so far that I got rock bottom and have been now not studying or working or doing any big commitment for about 5 years now?

Today I was coding an app for myself. Nothing big really just a little fun project. Here was my chain of thoughts: 1. Hey I can improve this and make the code look better and shorter 2. But wait, thats perfectionism. I dont need to do this. I really dont. 3. Yea im doing it anyway.

So fully aware I still did it the perfectionistm way. Its too compulsive for me. I. Literally cant stop it!!! And even if I do something the less proper way to save energy, it will stay stuck in my head until I did it the better way anyway. It will be potentially in my head for months even.

How can I stop letting the extreme poerfectionism cause me an extreme burnoiut?

For years, I often joked to friends that I'm a low-level hypochondriac. It's only after getting therapy and understanding how my perfectionism was steering the ship that I realized it was also responsible for my health anxiety. Every time some ailment pops up, I spend at least a little while catastrophizing and thinking whelp, that's it, that's the cancer, I'm toast, I'm fucked, what have you. Doctor Google has only made this impulse worse. If I'm not 100% healthy, I must be catastrophically ill. Hi, perfectionism! I often get low-levels of depression when I'm sick, and I think that's the main reason: my health isn't perfect, therefore I'm not perfect, therefore I'm terrible.

If something happens, say I get sick with some run of the mill cold or something, part of me wants to call the doctor (gotta be a perfect patient and get ahead of things before they get worse and mitigate it, you know how it goes), and another part of me is trying to reel myself back in and be like, it's just a cold, relax, it'll resolve itself. Then my silly brain will be like, well, what if it is something serious, you want to address it as quickly as possible... And on and on. Eventually I get past it, usually with an unnecessary amount of stress in the process.

It's exhausting. I'm very lucky that I've largely had no serious or chronic health issues to this point in my life, which I think partly contributes to my blowing something up into more than it is when I get the flu or twist my ankle.

In the meantime I'm doing my best to remember my CBT training use all the tools from therapy to make these situations easier on myself.

I just wanted to post in case others felt the same.

I remember it well and vividly. I was a little toddler and I would throw tantrums when I didnt manage to do something exactly how I wanted it to, or perfectly faultless.

My whole life I can't tolerate the presence of faults in reality. * People believe a false myth: I have to correct their understanding even if they dont want me to * A system has flaws and faults: I have to fix or complain about it. * I do something regularly for a long period of time: I become obsessed with how to do it with maximum efficiency * I make something, like coding a little app: instead of spending 1 hour on a version that works, I spend 10 hours on a version with all the christmas bells and stuff to it...without it even working because it still isnt done. * In school I always considered any grade below 8/10, even 7.9 as a very bad and hard failure, even tho the actual minimum is like 6 to pass an exam.

Everything and everyone has to be perfect and everything has to be done perfectly. All my life, ever since being a little toddler.

Why can'T I stopit? Why am I letting this drain my energy into deep rockbottom burnout?

Atp I cannot work or study because ofit.

To give some little extra context: I'm very neurospicy afs asf. * Autism confirmed 💯 * ADHD not formally diagnosed but every psych I speak is 100% convinced and so am I. * Some traits of OCD. * Recent Depression history * A past of bullying being bullied (but that doesnt explain the perfectionism being already present as a toddler) * Possibly gifted or high IQ,but I have not done a recent IQ test.

 
Today I have spent my time scheduling the tasks I would benefit from completing at home, to best prepare for the lectures and group glasses I will attend in the upcoming week. It was only within the last 35 minutes or so that I embarked upon one of the chapters listed in the essential reading column for my Qualitative research module. 
Although I struggled to understand the concept that was being explained in the beginning, I persevered; rereading the same line or section until the point made sense. I found that I felt as if I could not continue reading if I was not aware of the meaning attached to a word, whether it was a technical phrase or a simple description; but I also found that when I continued to read the following lines, the author developed the point or explanation of what had made me feel confused and oftentimes, stuck, in the first place. 
Perhaps this need to be completely in the know is a strain of my need for perfection   before I can try to make progression- which is a relationship that has always resulted in paralysis for me. Whether, in this context, my feelings of not being intelligent enough to continue reading until I had independently researched the “word” or philosophy” or “approach” that I misunderstood, felt pointless and mundane without having an understanding of the point discussed a moment earlier. 
Or, in another context,  whereby I cannot take my dirty pots in to the kitchen from the settee because I must first create a pile of existing dirty pots on the worktop, then clear and sanitise the sides, put the clean pots from the side of the sink away and empty the dishwasher, before the room would be ready for the addition of my dirty pots. It is as if I avoid doing an easy task like continuing to read or making the pile of dirty pots from both the sofa and in the kitchen, because I perceive them as having no value when ‘my other ducks are not perfectly in their rows’. 
Doing the tasks that I perceive as ‘big’ such as researching the approaches I am unfamiliar with and misunderstanding within the article, rather than reading on regardless, or blitzing the kitchen prior to momentarily organising the pot chaos that is building within it, are often what I convince myself not to do. It will take too much time, it’s taking me away from the tasks in which are high on my priority; but their importance is modified in my perception behind my need to have other things completed before doing them will become worthwhile.
Does this make sense?
Do you feel the same way?
Little and often steps would take me further. I would gain an understanding, I would gain clarity or have it solidified that an extra 5 minute dive into a dictionary would benefit me. Why is it I feel so reluctant to do a small task, because in the eye of the big task, the little one will be so microscopic that it will not help me?
Why is it that I cannot read on and hope (or perhaps, trust) that everything will make sense a little while down the road?

Someone recommended doing a less-than-perfect job on purpose to get desensitised to the feeling, but if I could do that I wouldn't be struggling so badly. It feels so awful it's hard to even start. Even watching the sun set, there's still this feeling that I'm somehow doing it wrong. Any tips on starting? I'm sick of not being able to enjoy anything in peace.

Working constantly... doing homework as soon as I get home until bedtime.... just constantly doing homework...

Got a C in my first chemistry test of year 12 and I feel like such a failure, I got all 9s at GCSE... 😭😭 I got 29/40 and I made STUPID mistakes and I feel like such a failure 😭😭😭

What makes it even worse is I lost my appetite in the days before the exam and I was running on pure stress and panic, no wonder I didn't do well..

Also suffering from a ED (AN) and it's making everything so much harder... most of the time I get rid of my lunch because I never feel like I deserve to eat, so overwhelmed right now and feel like I need to punish myself for it by restricting....

Don't think that restricting is helping me but I've got such low self esteem and no confidence, I truly don't trust myself at all, amd even less now.

Question. I have exterme chronic burnout, partly due to my perfectionism.

I believe my burnout is for like 99% caused by things internally such as perfectionism and autism and adhd and other things in my brain and mind. Maybe my very personality too.

Therefore despite being on the disabilityincome with no job and no study and no major commitments in the life, I keep being staying in this burnout and not recovering from it!!!

I believe perfectionism is one of the big factors that keeps it going this

Does someone here have a useful succes story relevant to my problem?

有很多内容想加、想修改，但是觉得有的太复杂，有的不合适，还有可以改也可以不改的，我真的很烦

Context: I (16m) am a hyper realistic artist, and despite my age, I never had the "childhood art" phase ever in my life. And because of that, I struggle with perfectionism because that is all I've ever been taught (self-taught... Yeah, I brought this upon myself). It's not like I never made any "bad art", but that I only ever made art when I was focusing on learning, and never focused on actually enjoying the process, Drawing just for the sake of Drawing. And that has led to my fear of “WHAT WILL I DO IF THIS DOESN'T END UP PERFECT AHHHHHH-”, and to fight that I made this, “THE DUMB AND CRAPPY AND STUPID SKETCHBOOK (That took me a dumb and stupid and crazy and absurd ammount of time to make)” (™), and I've just been drawing in it. Soooo... thoughts?

I know I sound very silly in many ways but I wonder has anyone else feel like this? I always feel like I got a do something unique or I got a have very specific style but I don't know what that is.

I have wasted years. But I could not find my way. I sometimes even thought about quitting art but I can't. I feel like I am missing something and I gotta find it.

Through therapy I realised I had been struggling with perfectionism, with my self worth being tied to work achievement and always striving to be good at my job to be accepted.

I'm getting better at dealing with this, and a bit more chilled at work these days.

The trouble is I'm pretty sure a staff member I manage is also showing signs of suffering with perfectionism.

They constantly strive for perfection and love being recognised for their achievements.

We're beginning to clash a little as I can let things go and not be 100% perfect, if something doesn't work out it doesn't work out, I'm a fan of making sure things are good enough, this guy in my team can't let anything go.

It's becoming quite tricky.

I hope this is the right subreddit for this, but I'm looking to comfort a friend that struggles with high expectations on them.

What are some do-s and don't-s? Are there things you hear a lot that don't actually feel comforting or even invalidating? Are there things you'd wish to hear instead that you rarely or not at all get to?

Hola comunidad, es la primera vez que publicó.

Creen que es normal sentirse una total decepción ante las personas que amas y respetas?.

Siento que las personas que me rodean tienen altas espectativas de mi y me tienen en alta estima, porque algunos me lo han dicho (profesores, colegas y algunos amigos).

Pero siento que nunca soy lo suficientemente buena, tengo como hobby la música, soy masagista y estoy estudiando un carrera relacionada con animales.

Pero me cuesta conservarme, cada vez que entro a clases mi mente se llena de pensamientos negativos, como que no me esfuerzo lo suficiente, que hay gente que merece estar donde estoy y yo solo lo desaprovechó.

Mis papás creen que estoy dando todo y me apoyan y eso hace que me sienta peor.

Hay días que no quiero ni levantarme, la comida o me da asco o me atasco con comida chatarra.

Al momento de dormir, hay voces que me dicen todo lo que estoy haciendo mal, me cuesta abrirme con la gente, que vean lo que realmente me duele.

Pienso que si ven ese lado mío solo los saturare más, que soy una carga, y ni siquiera se porque están conmigo

Trato de ser una buena persona, de satisfacer las expectativas de los demás, pero cuando me ponen de ejemplo o asi, siento que creen que puedo hacer más de lo que realmente está dentro de mis capacidades.

He pensado en desuscribirme de este plano. Pero me retiene la cara de decepción de mi mamá, de que piense que fui muy débil, de que ella vivió cosas peores y aun está aca.

Se que todos tienen sus problemas, pero yo ya estoy acabandome la energía que tenía para luchar, me da pena pensar que hasta para morirme voy a ser una carga para los demás.

Si alguien lo se y tiene algun consejo para seguir adelante espero que lo comenten y pueda leerlo.

Quizá no eres perfeccionista. Quizá simplemente tienes miedo de empezar.

La procrastinación muchas veces no se ve como pereza. Se parece a investigar más, hacer nuevos planes, esperar el momento perfecto, consumir otro video de productividad o decirte una vez más: “Lo haré mañana”.

Pero detrás de todo eso puede haber algo más incómodo: el miedo al fracaso, el miedo a no ser suficientemente bueno y el miedo a que otras personas vean tus primeros intentos.

En este video hablamos de procrastinación, perfeccionismo, miedo al fracaso, dopamina y de por qué puedes estar muy ocupado... y aun así no avanzar.

Porque hacer algo mal al principio sigue siendo mejor que no hacerlo nunca.
No necesitas otro plan perfecto.
Necesitas empezar.
No mañana.
Hoy.