In spite of my best intentions, I had to stop myself in the middle of a flurry of activities this weekend. Multi-tasking at its worst, I'm afraid. I was filling out holiday cards, absent-mindedly petting the cat with my foot, talking to my mother on my cell phone, and keeping one eye on a lasagna in the oven. All at the same time. Meanwhile, I am certain that Mom knew my mind was in a million places because she kept repeating herself. Finally, she asked me to call later when I was not so busy.
And when will that be, I wondered, as I begin to beat myself up for my various failures, from being a bad cat-owner, to a sad excuse for a daughter, to probably a wretched cook, and so on.
This state of affairs is not intentional. I do not plan on spreading myself so thin that, even in my own estimation, I am unable to do anything well. It seems to be my personal default, though... what happens when I am not vigilant. It seems to get worse when I plan too many things in a block of time, set very high standards for myself, then heap on self-criticism when things don't go as I planned. Am I alone here?
Apparently not. Professionals, such as Dr. Kenneth Rice at the
If perfectionism is a pretty stable part of my personality, what can I change? To start, I can stop planning far too many things into a small block of time. In other words, one way I can stop setting myself up for constant failure in my own eyes by allowing myself to focus on fewer things at one time. Of course, it'd counter-productive to do fewer things but then hold myself accountable for perfection even in those, so maybe I should also wish for a big lump of realistic standards in my Christmas stocking.
3 comments:
Perfectionism during the holidays is an especially deadly combination! I've had experiences when I've had to throw up my hands and "give up" on a task or on some expectation - but then there is an amazing sense of relief that comes from something being off my plate. I guess you are suggesting that we consciously decide what we want to keep on our plate rather than have stuff slip and slide off!
Yes, that is exactly what I am trying to say! When I am over-committed, I am especially prone to handling things in ways that do not meet my own standards. I suspect that I need to loosen those often unreasonably high standards, but also not overload myself.
I recently heard the bright and beautiful Queen Rania of Jordan interviewed. Among other things she talked about “perfectionism.” “If you are trying to be a perfectionist, then you’re always going for either 100 percent or zero, which means that you go through life averaging 50%. But, if you accept the 70%, then you’re averaging 70% in your life, which is better.”
Sounds good to me. With a little more effort we can even push the 70%, or not.
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