I feel that this next post of mine deserves a prelude, since it has been about two years since I wrote anything. This piece (as evidenced by the title), is about my tendency towards perfectionism, which runs deep and manifests itself in whatever ways it can, including these blog posts. In starting this blog, I did not set out to be the most elegant writer, or to construct some outward persona for myself. I set out instead with the sole intention of writing authentically, in whatever style felt comfortable in the moment. I knew sometimes things would come out well, and other times my writing may fall flat. My goal was simply to keep writing, because I have found through the years that this practice keeps me feeling whole. Nevertheless, each time I sat down at my computer in the past two years, I found some excuse either not to begin writing or to refrain from posting the piece once it was written. Usually, a voice in my head came up with a reason why what I had written wasn’t good enough. This time, though, I’ve decided to push past that voice, if for the very least because it would feel pretty darn hypocritical to construct an entire post about perfectionism and then trash the thing at the last minute because it isn’t …. well, perfect. So, here is my imperfect piece on perfectionism.
If you had stumbled across me 5 years ago, you would have never guessed that I struggled with perfectionism. In fact, I felt I had mastered the art of balance. I didn’t kill myself studying for medical school exams but also never slacked, and I took a lot of pride in my ability to juggle multiple demands without obsessing about each one. I was amazingly adept at catching myself before I stumbled into the zone of workaholic, relax-aholic, or hobbie-aholic. It would seem that I had become preoccupied with the concept of balance. It wasn’t until recently, when my closeted perfectionistic tendencies began showcasing themselves in a more classic arena, that I realized my previous pursuit of balance was, in fact, simply a guilt-free outlet for my perfectionism to run rampant.
Last month, while studying for one of the medical licensing exams, I found myself becoming more and more frustrated that I could not get every single practice question right. Even though my scores on practice exams were improving steadily, I wasn’t able to see my progress. Here I was, faced with an exam that is effectively impossible to ace, but consumed with a need to be perfect. During that month of studying, it struck me how much I had changed in the past few years. I realized that I had transformed into someone who would sacrifice food, exercise, time with loved ones, and hobbies for my career. It didn’t take too long to realize that the origins of this switch in behavior were my recent PhD experience.
During the years working on my PhD, perfection became the name of the game. I spent exorbitant amounts of time writing, rewriting, trashing altogether, and then completely reworking numerous manuscripts. I would name them a-z, then start over with aa-zz, and so on. I didn’t just have drafts of papers… I had editions. When looking back at this behavior, I at first thought this was strange and signified a marked shift from my previous perspective. Slowly, however, I have started to realize that certain character traits are tricksters. For me, perfectionism will wear any disguise I allow it to (including the pursuit of balance, ironically). While I may be more mindful of this tendency than I was 5 years ago, learning to change my behaviors is a daily struggle. However, I’ve decided that I will call today a win… that is, if I am ultimately able to press the “publish” button.