#134: Defeat perfectionism with one weird trick
Yeah, okay, clickbaity title, but I really do want to share with you a helpful way of reframing perfectionism that I've been thinking about recently. Perfectionism happens when our lack of confidence in our ability to succeed meets our lack of knowledge about what success requires. Overcoming it requires filling in the gaps in our knowledge and finding constructive ways to respond to our lack of confidence. How do we do this? Well, by thinking about what we do when we're hungry, and also by thinking about getting wedged in an unground tunnel. Hear me out.
Episode transcript:
If it has to be perfect, maybe you don’t want it that badly. Yes, I’m trolling you.
You’re listening to The Academic Imperfectionist. I’m Dr Rebecca Roache. I’m a coach and a philosopher at the University of London, and in this podcast I draw on philosophical analysis and coaching insights to help you dump perfectionism and flourish on your own terms.
Hi, my friends. Just a heads up: I’m going to make reference to disordered eating in this episode. Oh, and also getting wedged in underground tunnels. If those topics are likely to make your day worse rather than better, please skip this episode. And if that leaves you stuck for alternative podcasts to listen to instead, then keep listening for a little while, because I’m going to tell you about some of my favourite podcasts in just a moment. I’ll let you know when it’s time to hit eject.
First of all, though. Let me share something with you. I am absolutely mortified. You know I’m on Patreon, right? There’s a mention at the end of every episode. When I first set this up, I would occasionally get an email notification to let me know when someone had very kindly supported the podcast financially, and I’d email them to say thanks. I didn’t really pay much attention to the Patreon website itself. In the last few days, for no particular reason, I went and took a look at the website and I see that there are far more people who have very generously pledged their hard-earned cash than I thought - and horrifyingly, I have never got in touch with about half of them to say thanks! If you’re one of those kind souls, I am so sorry. I am going to be contacting everyone as soon as I finish yapping to you here. It might be a bit out of the blue to some of you - while there are some people who donate monthly, others gave one-off gifts going back years, and might have forgotten all about it. I’ve noticed that, on some podcasts, people who subscribe via Patreon get a shout-out at the start of new episodes. I think that’s a lovely way to acknowledge people’s support, and the only reason I am not doing it here is that the names of my kind supporters don’t show up publicly and I don’t want to break anyone’s confidence. If I live long enough, perhaps I’ll get around to working out if there’s a way to allow people who support me to opt to go public and get a shout-out, just like on those better-organised podcasts I’ve been listening to. But as ever, it’s just me doing this, along with all the other things I have going on, so who knows? Anyway. If you’re interested in joining my little army of Imperfectionist fairy godparents, you can do that at patreon.com/academicimperfectionist - and I promise to keep a better eye on things going forward and to get in touch with a proper thank-you.
That’s the grovelling apologies over with, but let’s stick for a moment with the topic of those other podcasts. Someone asked me recently what podcasts I listen to, so let me take you through a few of them. I’ll say, first of all, that I don’t tend to listen to any podcasts that are similar to this one, although I used to, in the days before The Academic Imperfectionist. I stopped, I think, because I like to switch off and relax when I’m listening to podcasts, and if they’re too similar to this one I don’t find them relaxing - though not necessarily in a bad way. Often they’re inspiring and they give me ideas for new episodes and then I start thinking about that - which is usually not what I want when I’m at the gym or drifting off to sleep or whatever. I think the very first podcast I got into, after I first discovered what podcasts are, was Casefile, the Australian true-crime podcast. I still really enjoy that one, and I devour new episodes as soon as they’re released. There are some other true-crime ones I enjoy, but Casefile is my favourite, and believe it or not, I place it firmly in the ‘drifting off to sleep’ category of podcasts. I quite enjoy the experience of being somewhere between waking and sleeping and having moments of thinking, ‘hang on, what the fuck?!’ as I hear about some nasty Australian outback mutilation. There are limits, though. Violence against kids or animals, anything really sadistic or misogynistic, makes me too stressed to nod off. Along with stuff like getting wedged in caves, especially underwater. I’m not claiming that the category of ‘topics that disrupt Rebecca’s attempts to fall asleep’ is in any way homogenous, so don’t write in. Also in the podcasts-to-nod-off-to category are spooky paranormal ones. I do enjoy hearing about spooky experiences that are difficult to explain. My favourite podcast in this category is called Scary, and as a bonus, the Irish host has a very nice soothing voice. I also like a similar one called Hey That’s Weird.
And then, when I’m not trying to fall asleep, there’s a whole other category of podcasts I enjoy, which are more health and fitness related - stuff about running, what sort of workouts are best, and so on. I’d say that, maybe 65% of the time, I’m looking for information that will help me make positive changes so that I can be healthier - preferably changes that don’t involve making more than a minimal effort with food, because I really hate cooking, and I also hate planning what to eat and even thinking about food. For the other 35%, I like to hear people talk about things that we ought to be doing and which I’m already doing, so that I can feel like a smug class swot. Things like, ‘You really ought to be strength training, most people aren’t strength training’ while I’m mid-deadlift, that kind of thing. Stuff that feeds into my toxic need for validation from strangers, which is probably a need that motivates most of what I do. Joking-not-joking there. I don’t really think it’s just about wanting to feel smug - I think there’s that constant background fear of being overtaken by Slobby Rebecca, who would have me cash in my gym membership and running club fees and spend it all instead on shortbread biscuits and takeaways. I don’t usually struggle with motivation to work out, but I don’t take that motivation for granted either, and so listening to podcasts that affirm it is a sort of insurance policy against the encroachment of Slobby Rebecca. By contrast, if there is one category of podcast I absolutely avoid like the plague, it’s politics. I never, ever want to hear about politics, I’m sorry, for sanity-preservation reasons. Anything along those lines really is likely to send me into a spiral of despair. While I have no problem nodding off to sleep while hearing about serial killers and demons, the current state of the world really is too mind-corruptingly terrifying, at any time of day
Ok, I promise there is a point to all this - keep listening, because here comes a seamless segue into my topic for this episode, which is also your cue to stop listening if you’re wanting to heed that warning I gave right at the start. I’m always on the lookout for new podcasts to enjoy, and recently I discovered the Movement Logic podcast, which is about exercise, and is aimed at women. I’m really enjoying it, and I’ve been making my way through their back catalogue of episodes. In an episode I listened to a few days ago - and I’m sorry, but I didn’t make a note of which one - one of the hosts (either Laurel Beversdorf or Sarah Court - I’m not very skilled yet at working out who’s talking and when) came up with a fantastic analogy to help push back against perfectionism. She - Laurel/Sarah - immediately apologised for the bad analogy, and her co-host - Sarah/Laurel - corrected her and said no, that’s a great analogy. I am 100% in agreement with the co-host, and I want to talk about the analogy here, and to dissect it and apply it to your battle with perfectionism.
So, the discussion was about starting an exercise regime, and the importance of just starting with something, even if it’s not the perfect regime. And then Laurel or Sarah said - and I’m paraphrasing here - it’s like if you’re really hungry, just eating something is going to help, even if it’s not the perfect meal. In situations where we’re really hungry, most of us will take eating something over nothing. We won’t hold out for the ideal meal. We’re like, God, I’m so hungry - just give me that pile of Bounties that nobody wanted from the tub of Celebrations, I don’t care. If you don’t get the Celebrations reference, hopefully you get the gist. If someone isn’t willing to eat non-ideal food despite claiming to be hungry, we can be forgiven for being sceptical about their claim to be hungry. You know, like when you were a kid and claimed to be super hungry but also you didn’t want to eat that gross plate of sprouts you’ve been offered, and your stern, logical parent or teacher smugly observes that obviously you can’t be as hungry as you claim.
Perhaps the lesson here about perfectionism is clear, but let me earn my keep as a pedantic philosopher by breaking it down. I think that an important consideration that this hunger analogy brings out is that, ordinarily, when we want something to eat, there’s more than one need or desire that we’re trying to satisfy. One, obviously, is a need to take in enough energy (in calories) to allow our body to function. But eating is more complicated than that, and for most of us, that basic need is already satisfied pretty much all of the time, and so we have other things in mind when we’re deciding whether and what to eat. Perhaps you’ve been listening to health podcasts and decided that you need to ‘optimise’ by avoiding eating any plants grown in soil with a pH below 6.4. (I have no idea if that’s a thing, I just made it up.) And why not? You can afford to care about optimising as long as your basic need for sustenance is taken care of, but otherwise, it becomes irrelevant. If, like one of those people whose stories I don’t like to hear when I’m drifting off, you’re about to be rescued after 3 weeks wedged in an underground tunnel with nothing to eat or drink and your organs are about to shut down, you’re not trying to optimise, you just need to survive. Who cares about the pH of that squashed Kendal Mint Cake that your rescuers are trying to shove down your throat while they take your pulse? Just get it down you, love. Worry about perfection when you’re back on your feet.
One way of framing perfectionism is as a binary choice between not doing something at all, and doing it perfectly. Which is crazy when it’s put that way, right? At least, it’s clearly crazy in the cave rescue example. So why is it so easy to get sucked in by perfectionism in other cases? I’ve got a few ideas, and I think reflecting on them gives us some strategies to resist it.
The big one, I think, has to do with simply not understanding what’s at stake. We all understand hunger, right? We understand that we die without food, and also we understand that when we’re not facing death from hunger, we can afford to be a bit more picky. And the reason we understand all this is because for almost all of us, almost all the time, we’re occupying that middle ground. We’re neither about to expire from lack of food, nor eating a perfectly optimised diet. We’re imperfect but adequate. We’re never tempted to think about eating in binary terms because the nuance is impossible for us to ignore. What’s more, not many of us are even bothered about perfection when it comes to eating. When we try to make improvements in the way we eat, those improvements happen in that middle ground. Eat pizza once a week instead of twice. Make dessert an occasional treat instead of after every meal. Cultural messages about what healthy eating looks like focus on moderation, not perfection. Perfectionist attitudes to eating strike us as extreme, unrealistic, linked to disorder - which is not to deny their appeal to some people.
Not so with those other things, the ones you get all perfectionistic about, though, is it? Your writing, for example. It’s not uncommon for perfectionism to hold us back there - to prevent us from even getting the words down. What’s going on there then?
I think that in part, we just lack a sense of what that spectrum between inadequate and perfect looks like. Think about your thesis, or that other writing project you’re currently struggling with, or whatever else is threatening to freeze you into a perfectionistic statue. Do you have a clear, detailed sense of what it would be like to complete that project in a way that is ‘good enough, but only just good enough’? And what about the difference between that, and ‘a little bit flawed, but pretty impressive’? And how about ‘not perfect, but absolutely incredible even so’ - where on the spectrum between ‘rubbish’ and ‘perfect’, and where in relation to each other, do all those things fit? It’s pretty common not to have much sense of any of that nuance. And although we’re often told things like ‘good enough is good enough’, it takes quite a lot of confidence to be able to make a judgment - all on our own, and about a project we care deeply about - that something we’ve produced is good enough despite being flawed. I mean, let’s bear in mind that much of the time these projects that mean so much to us are not simply about producing good work, but also about belonging. You care deeply about gaining acceptance into a community - whether that’s researchers in your field, academics in general, members of a particular society, or whatever. Often, these are communities full of people we admire, and whose validation is important to us. We want them to welcome us as a fellow community member, and at the same time we’re terrified that we’ll be rejected. So, being able to view our work as imperfect yet good enough involves being able to accept that we have flaws and yet we belong anyway, when it’s not up to us whether we belong or not. That’s incredibly difficult to do. We’re emotional. We’re rejection-sensitive. Aiming for perfection is a safety thing. It’s hard to know what ‘good enough’ looks like, but we know - or we think we do - what perfection looks like, so if we set our sights on that, we know where we are and we stand the best chance of success. But, of course, that comes at a high price. It might be clear(ish) to us what we need to do to get there, but the idea of perfection is so intimidating that we can barely get started.
So, where do you go from here?
First thing, I think, is to separate the ignorance problem from the confidence problem. There is a middle ground here, you just don’t know yet what it looks like, or where you can locate yourself in it - like, do you fall more towards the ‘barely adequate’ side, or more towards the ‘as near to perfect as a mere mortal can hope to get’ side? That’s the ignorance problem. The confidence problem is that you’re not convinced that you’re good enough to be able to accept less than perfection, and still end up being adequate.
Let’s take those problems in reverse. So, the confidence problem. That’s basically just an illusion. That lack of confidence that drives you to aim for perfection draws on the assumption that aiming for perfection is in some way a safe option. Aim impossibly high, that way, you stand the best chance of succeeding. But, of course, it’s not. Aiming impossibly high doesn’t help you do good work. It stifles you. You end up afraid even to make a start, and of course the moment you do start, you’re already firmly in the zone of imperfection - I mean, come on - whose work is perfect right from the start? Be brave. Be willing to start off in the ‘barely adequate’ zone, and refine as you go. You won’t reach perfection, but you can make things as good as you can realistically hope to make them, and that’s really the best shot you’ve got.
The ignorance problem, then. You don’t currently know what the middle ground looks like. That’s something you can fix, but only if you’re willing to venture into that middle ground, and that means being brave enough to do work that you accept will be imperfect. Getting a sense of what that middle ground looks like isn’t just a mind trick to break you out of your perfectionistic paralysis - it’s something that will improve your life, and your chances of success. I mean, imagine if Cave Rescue teams were fixated on perfection. No trying to rescue trapped explorers by offering them a squashed Kendal Mint Cake - it’s either go down there with an exquisitely prepared, optimally balanced meal, or don’t bother attempting a rescue at all. No in between. If someone with that attitude hoped to make a success of the old cave rescuing, they’d be at a serious disadvantage - and so would the poor people who needed rescuing. Their cave rescuing capabilities would be greatly enhanced were they to address the gap in their knowledge of the middle ground between a failed rescue and a gourmet banquet one.
The same goes for you. If you imagine a spectrum with failure at one end and perfection at the other, do you know what the space in between looks like? If not, and if you want to succeed, find out. You’ll probably find that you can get some way towards sketching out that middle ground on your own, just by acknowledging that you’re viewing things in binary terms and opening your mind to the possibility of an imperfect but good enough outcome. Let’s say you’re trying to write an article that you hope to get published. Have you ever, in your entire life, come across an imperfect published article? I expect you have - probably every academic discipline is sustained primarily on the basis of people pointing out shortcomings in the work that has been done so far, after all. That’s not to say you should deliberately build mistakes into what you’re writing, but perhaps this perspective will help you keep your composure the next time you (or someone else) discovers a flaw in your work.
You can ask more experienced people for help here too. What do they think is good enough? The last time you got critical feedback on your work, what did it actually say? Did you even pay attention to what it said, or did you focus on the rejection and nothing else, and throw yourself into an existential spiral? I mean, if you did, that’s completely understandable, and we’ve all done it. But we miss out if we don’t go back and extract information from that sort of feedback. When we focus solely on the rejection, we’re thinking only about the confidence problem that I mentioned a moment ago - the problem that lures us into the doomed task of aiming for perfection. So, when you’ve finished having your completely normal and understandable screaming tantrum, pull yourself together, hit pause on your emotions, and return to that negative feedback with a completely dispassionate head, and focus on extracting information: what does this teach you about the shape of the space between failure and perfection? Obviously it’s really hard to take this sort of dispassionate attitude, so you’ll probably find that it helps to sit down with a supportive colleague or friend to help you work through the lessons worth drawing.
And finally. Remember what I said earlier when I was talking about hunger? That if you claim to be hungry, and yet you refuse to eat anything but the perfect meal, then those around you would be forgiven for concluding that you’re probably not very hungry after all. If you’re genuinely hungry, you’ll settle for adequate. It might help to keep this in mind next time you find yourself unable even to make a start because you’re so set on perfection. Channel that smug, judgy teacher, and tell yourself that if you’re willing to sit there doing nothing, you probably don’t care about success as much as you claim to. If you really want it, then you’ll settle for a small, imperfect step in the right direction.
Good luck, my hungry friends.
I’m Dr Rebecca Roache, and you’ve been listening to The Academic Imperfectionist. If you enjoyed the episode, please subscribe on whatever podcast app you use. I want to help as many people as I can with these episodes, and I’d really appreciate it if you’d share the podcast with any friends who you think might find it useful, and if you’d leave a review on your podcast app. If you’d like to support the podcast financially, you can do that at patreon.com/academicimperfectionist. For more information about me, the podcast, and my coaching, please visit the website - academicimperfectionist.com. You can find me on Medium too, as AcademicImperfectionist. If you have an idea or a request for a future episode of The Academic Imperfectionist, please drop me a line, either via the contact form on my website or via Medium. Thanks for listening, and see you next time!
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