Letting Go of Perfectionism—Is It Possible?

Yesterday, for the umpteenth time, I was confronted with one of my greatest weaknesses: perfectionism. It has plagued me my entire life, and even though it has taken on much milder forms during my recovery, it remains a real stumbling block for me.

Ever since I was young, I’ve struggled with it. It was simply never an option for me to be “just good enough.” And as I write this, I realize I should be writing “to perform just good enough.” Yet I consciously choose the word “be,” because that’s how I’ve always experienced it. Today I know there’s a difference between the two, but I didn’t know that back then. I thought my self-worth and the love of others (and myself!) depended on my performance. It wasn’t because of my family, by the way, because Mom always said that the most important thing was that we did our best, not what results we got. And I did do my best. Way too much, in fact. I remember being in eighth grade, just shy of fourteen years old, and school was really too demanding for me. I loved the program I was in and really wanted to keep doing it, but at a different school. It seemed that the same program at other schools in the area would be much less demanding, and since you end up with the same diploma anyway, changing schools seemed like a good idea to me. Maybe it would give me some breathing room?

Mom and I went to the CLB (the Flemish Center for Student Guidance), and the advice I got there was to just study a little less hard, “because why do you want to get 80–90%, when 65% is more than enough?” Good point, and in all honesty: I’d never even considered before that getting less than 80% and not trying as hard was actually an option. And even though I wanted to, I couldn’t. It was much stronger than myself. The hard work, the perfectionism, and the fear of failure became very compulsive, and it’s always stayed that way. It’s one of those things in my life that has caused me the most pain and sorrow. As I write this, I’m even crying. It still hurts, deeply.

When I entered Twelve Step recovery, I identified my perfectionism—through working the Sixth and Seventh Steps—as one of my character defects. Of course, it’s a bit simplistic to view this as a character defect (or a shortcoming, another word we use). Later on, I rebelled against it; I felt the urge to analyze everything. To look into the origin of this behavior, to see it as something that must have helped me at one point but stopped doing so afterward. But honestly, that approach—overanalyzing it—brought me more pain than peace, so I went back to the simple Twelve Step approach of identifying it as a character defect.

The Sixth and Seventh Steps are childishly simple, but incredibly effective: we identify our character defects and turn them over to God. That’s it. Every day we say: “God, these are my character defects, and I turn them over to You. Do with them as You will” (if you want to know the “real” Seventh Step prayer: Google knows it. It’s worth looking it up!). I also found it helpful in Step Six to write a brief inventory of each character defect by answering a few questions:

- What is my character defect?

- What was my life like with this character defect?

- How do I imagine my life without it?

- Write a short prayer in which you give this character defect to God.

For a long time, I surrendered my character defects to God every day, and—miraculously!—He truly took them away from me. Of course, other, deeper-seated character defects then surfaced, but that’s peeling the onion, of course. The path to recovery is never finished, and that’s just fine, because it’s supposed to be that way!

Through recovery, through surrendering my perfectionism to God, I’ve already grown a lot in this area. It’s not as bad as it used to be, and most importantly: I know that my self-worth no longer depends on my achievements. The woman who has been my sponsor for five years told me right from the very beginning: “You’re a human being, not a human doing.” For this insight—and so much more—I will always be grateful to her. Not performing, not doing, but simply being, and feeling worthy enough in that. It’s not easy, and it’s been quite a process of growth, but I do feel that I’m doing reasonably well now. Spiritually and emotionally, it’s no longer as disruptive or compulsive as it once was.

And yet. Even today, it remains a pitfall, one that has come up repeatedly even while setting up and writing this blog. The hours and time I’ve put into laying out every page... Oh my goodness! But even there, I’ve already had some progressive victory. For instance, at one point I started ending every blog post with a “signature”—a little image with my name on it. It was very tempting for me to go back and edit every old blog post—both Dutch and English—to insert that there as well, so everything would be neatly consistent. I made a conscious decision not to give in to that compulsion. God wanted me to have peace and learn to let go, rather than have every page perfectly synchronized. Because the underlying fear is, of course: “What would people think otherwise? Would I still be good enough?” And the reality is that people don’t notice things like that, and are usually more concerned with themselves than with me. And also that it doesn’t matter what others think of me. What God thinks of me is the only thing that counts. And so I choose to let go, to consciously choose “mistakes.” This I can’t do on my own, but God gives me the strength to do it!

Yesterday, I was tested in this regard once again—I believe by God Himself. Yesterday afternoon, I had the incredible honor of listening to someone’s testimony in a relatively small online group. He shared how, after years of fighting against the existence of God, he was finally able to welcome Christ into his heart. It was so beautiful. So, so, so beautiful. I had goosebumps and felt tears welling up the whole time. It was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard. So pure, that love of God in his heart. I realized afterward that I couldn’t stop thinking about it. While I was cleaning—because those are the moments when God speaks to me: while walking, cleaning, meditating, ... —I suddenly thought: how cool would it be if he wrote a guest blog for Making Lemonade? And then: what if we did this, say, once a month, having a guest writer who shares how God has turned difficult situations in his or her life to good? How awesome would that be?!

Of course, my enthusiasm was immediately accompanied by crippling fear, because that would mean I’d have to let go of control. That I’d actually have to trust that it’s God writing this blog, and not me. Because that’s what I tell myself: that He’s the one in charge, and I’m just the one carrying out His will. Before writing every post, I pray for hours and ask God what He wants me to write. I ask Him to let me be an instrument of His message. So I truly believe that He is in control of this blog, and not me. But putting my money where my mouth is—that’s a whole different story. And so, because there’s no such thing as half-hearted surrender, and half-trust is really no trust at all, I asked if this person would be the very first guest blogger for Making Lemonade. And he agreed! Scary for me, but very valuable. This is a wonderful opportunity to grow spiritually and let go of so-called control (which is ultimately just an illusion anyway).

Right away I thought, “Cool, we can do this every month,” and I started thinking about who else I could ask. And then, again during one of those moments of silence, I heard God say: “Leave it to Me, My child. I will bring the right people onto your path, at the right moments. Don’t impose a strict schedule, obligations, and deadlines on yourself. Don’t do that to yourself, trying to arrange a guest blogger every month. Just leave it up to Me. Sometimes it will be three times a month, sometimes three times a year. I’ll take care of it. Just trust Me.”

And so I trust, and I take a big leap of faith. I let go and let God. And by doing that, a little more healing will take place within me, and I will be able to live more and more in freedom and serenity. Thanks be to God!