Philosophers from the time of Plato have conceived of and written about mental perfection, or the perfection of thought-forms and ideas. Some psychologists believe the concept of perfection is one of the archetypes, or unconscious collective mental templates, with which we’re born.

The fact that we can conceive of the perfect thought-form or image does not mean it can be actualized. Our ability to conceive of a perfect image combined with our failure to realize the impossibility of actualizing this image in our behavior is the basic confusion that creates the suffering of never measuring up for the perfectionist.

It is as if our minds play a cruel trick on us, taunting us to actualize the perfect images they produce. We need to be able to recognize and appreciate these images without believing they can be made absolutely real. This is not so easy to do when we are told "you’ll see it when you believe it," or "you totally create your own reality" or other such slogans that tantalize us with the notion that we can and should be able to turn all of our images and fantasies into real-world behavior.

When we don’t make this crucial distinction, believing that perfection is attainable in the world of human performance, we have "taken the bait" and stepped into the perfection trap. In the same way that we can imagine a pink elephant but realize that one doesn’t really exist, we can imagine our performance being perfect without burdening ourselves with the belief that such an image can necessarily be actualized.

This is why we say that perfection is a fantasy, a mental image or idea of what we consider to be the ultimate standard as we wish it could be realized in the world. In our striving for excellence, we can only approach what we consider to be the perfect athletic performance, body, relationship, vacation, life-style or religious experience. Such an experience may feel whole, complete and satisfying, but no matter how close the perfectionist comes to her image of perfection, knowing she has fallen short of the image results in feelings of inadequacy.

This is why, for the perfectionist, good enough is never enough. This implies that if we can learn to sever the false but powerful and unconscious connection between conceiving of perfection versus achieving it, we can spare ourselves of much of the suffering and torture attached to this impossible pursuit.

Jesse Jackson used to go around to schools instilling confidence in children by telling them, "If you can conceive it, you can achieve it!" This was a catchy slogan for them, and it worked to give them hope that their dreams and efforts could make a difference.

But the slogan just isn’t true. We can conceive of all kinds of things that no matter how hard we try, we may not achieve. Coming to grips with this dose of reality is especially important for the perfectionist.

Our inability to be satisfied with a "good enough" performance offers us an alternative way we can think of perfectionism. We can view it as "the practice of demanding of ourselves and others a higher quality of performance than is required by the situation."

‘NEVER ENOUGH’ THINKING

"He who knows that enough is enough
will always have enough."
—Lao Tze

Here are the ways the "never enough" mentality influences the way perfectionists think about their own performance:

The goal set is unrealistically or even impossibly high.

Joan tells me that she considers herself a "failure" because she has not had all of the articles she submitted to a magazine accepted for publication. Even though she’s had a number of them accepted, she is unable to handle the sense of worthlessness that lasts for days when she gets a rejection notice. Her all-or-nothing thinking shadows her acceptances and diminishes her work. She says she "just can’t stand" to have her acceptance record be less than perfect.

Perfectionists can’t tolerate simply coming close to the goal.

They cannot tolerate anything less than hitting it on the nose. They leave little room for acknowledging and valuing gradual steps of "successive approximation," or getting closer and closer to the goal with repeated practice. Coming close is the same as failing and this all-or-nothing thinking leads to self-disgust, anger, regret, and blame of self and others.

Perfectionists are unwilling to be beginners.

They have little tolerance for the feeling of frustration that is natural to learning a new skill. They expect and truly believe they ought to perform perfectly from the very start. While they may realize this is irrational, this does not stop them from believing it! If they can’t learn a new skill immediately, they will find some excuse for not staying with it, as they can’t tolerate feeling "foolish."

And they can’t stand the possibility of feeling dependent on another to teach them. In learning something new, we are often forced to get help from someone else, to depend on them to teach us and to surrender to their greater knowledge and skill. Perfectionists tend to avoid depending on others because they don’t want to acknowledge their limits. If they could allow themselves make mistakes, they would be willing to acknowledge their limits and accept feeling dependent on others to learn new tasks.