Perfectionism is a pretty sophisticated and complex construct.
Not only can perfectionism be split into three subtypes: socially-prescribed; other-oriented; self-orientated, but there are also two forms of perfectionism – adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism – and it’s maladaptive perfectionism that keeps you STUCK.
Let me explain…
Maladaptive or unhealthy perfectionists set extremely unrealistic goals. These goals aren’t just high, they are impossible to achieve, for example, feeling the pressure to be the best at everything, and for this reason, failure is often guaranteed.
When maladaptive perfectionists don’t meet these standards or they fail, it’s an extremely painful experience where they berate themselves, experience extreme negative emotions and undergo intense self-deprecation. They respond to these setbacks with either goal obsession or goal avoidance since a top priority for maladaptive perfectionists is avoiding failure at any cost, so for some, they may double or triple their efforts, but then others may go to the opposite extreme and avoid the experience or task altogether assuming they don’t align with their strengths and interests.
Unhealthy perfectionists often hold the belief that if they don’t hide their mistakes, their manager, professor or partner for example, may not admire them or may not think they’re good enough.
Does any of this sound familiar to you?
Adaptive or healthy perfectionists on the other hand, challenge themselves and respond to setbacks very differently and because of this, the outcomes of their perfectionism is radically different.
Adaptive perfectionists challenge themselves by setting high goals and standards which despite being high are not impossible to meet, they’re realistic, reasonable and achievable. Their striving towards high goals and standards in this healthy manner provides a challenge, strengthens them and promotes learning and growth.
When adaptive perfectionists fail or have performance setbacks, they tend to bounce back rather quickly by learning from their setbacks so they are able to stay engaged and keep making progress. They don’t get STUCK in a loop of self-doubt and are much more able to experience pleasure and satisfaction from their efforts and appreciate and accept that things won’t always go to plan.
Does this sound anything like you?
So now it might be easy to appreciate why these two distinct types of perfectionism have radically different outcomes on wellbeing and overall success and this is largely dictated by the coping strategies they employ when things don’t go to plan
Maladaptive perfectionists suffer significantly more than adaptive or healthy perfectionists and tend to resort to emotion oriented or avoidance based coping strategies. They try to reduce negative emotions, largely by avoidance of the situation or by denial of the existence of the issue, or by just giving up hope and assuming that the situation cannot be rectified.
On the other hand adaptive perfectionists use more task oriented coping strategies which are problem focused whereby they take direct action to alter the situation itself to reduce the amount of stress experienced. They assume the situation can be changed. These very different coping styles used when a difficulty hits contributes significantly to the outcome experienced by these two types of perfectionism.
The healthy practice of an adaptive perfectionists has an overall positive impact on their well being whereas the negative practices of a maladaptive perfectionist has an overall negative impact on their wellbeing.
Maladaptive perfectionism is strongly associated with depression, anxiety, OCD, burnout, low self-esteem, decreased productivity, procrastination, troubled personal relationships and neuroticism.
The bottom line is that maladaptive perfectionism will not only make it harder to achieve success in any endeavour but it will also create a miserable existence and could potentially shorten your lifespan.
