Month: November 2015

Managing the inner perfectionist

So I’m dispensing all this advice on how NOT to be a perfectionist, but how do I myself actually implement these strategies in my own life? Good question. The answer is in many and varied ways. I’ve written some of these into lessons. P1040276

Lesson 1: Fall in love with imperfectness

Yes I’ve actually learned to fall in love with my imperfectness in some ways. For example, it is very relaxing to just embrace the fact that I’m very weak in some areas and my flaws are what make me interesting and sometimes even funny. For example, the other night hubby and I were cleaning the kitchen together after dinner and I said, “how about I pack the dishwasher and then you repack it?” (Because I am a terrible dishwasher packer and he often does re-pack it because my packing is so bad!) And it was funny, that I’m shit at it, you know what I mean. I also suck at driving and some of the ways I’ve parked the car are just hilarious!

Lesson 2: reduce self- pressure, here are 5 ways I do:
1. Stop or minimize doing things I dislike
2. Fall in love with things being an imperfect part of the messy poetry of life
3. I don’t smile when I don’t feel like smiling
4. Always being genuine even it means I won’t be smiling.
5. Create a sulking space I can go to, to reset myself if I’m in foul mood I don’t want to inflict on anyone else.

 

Lesson 3: I trust my intuition
When you are a people pleaser you have lost connection with your own inner voice. Your insecurity about others liking you overshadows doing what is right for you. Something may feel wrong, but you do it anyway to please others. No I do not do that anymore.

Lesson 4: I have become comfortable with annoying and disappointing others occasionally
Yep this one has taken me a while. I’ve had to release a lot of guilt around this one. How did I do it? Gradually I think. At the start it was really hard but I think realizing that you can’t avoid this completely in life was one thing that helped, you know the reality check. And also I think it was a bit of a mental exercise in weighing up the needs involved. For example, I ask myself who’s needs are more important in this situation and if it’s a situation where I’m really exhausted and the other person wants me to do something minor like an errand or something, then it is clearly a no, because it’s fully my responsibility as an adult to make sure I get enough rest. Other situations are not so clear cut but it is about weighing it up and knowing when to put yourself first because you are worth caring about.

Lesson 5: I know what is my stuff and what stuff belongs to other people
I don’t take on board other people’s issues. If they get mad because I don’t do what they want, when I am behaving in a way that is right for me then I leave that anger with them.

Extra tips:
I forgive myself for my mistakes
I rest
I do things for myself, I give myself treats
I know how to move myself out of a bad mood fairly quickly
I catch myself before I head too far down that path
I acknowledge any guilt and try not to dwell there
I ask for help, this one can be really hard for me at times but I recognise that it is a healthy thing to do especially when I’m getting overwhelmed.
I make an effort to be the best person I can be, so if I make a slip up its not so often that it creates a large problem in my life.
I hope this helps!! Love and light, Honor

Everybody knows a perfectionist right? He or she is that person that has a lot of pressure on themselves to do everything to an extremely high standard. They can be wonderful but also extremely infuriating to the non-perfectionist. They can be infuriating for a number of reasons. Let me explain:
1. Because they tend to avoid conflict it is hard to discuss things with them,
2. They try to please everyone so they are often running around like a headless chook doing hundreds of things for other people and forgetting to rest and then getting grumpy and exhausted
3. Alternatively they are so anxious about making a mistake or being judged in a negative light that they spend periods of time avoiding everyone,
4. It is also hard to give them constructive feedback about things that will help them, as due to their sensitivity to criticism it often causes them to dissolve into tears.
HOWEVER, there are some pluses to being around a perfectionist, namely that because they have very high standards for themselves they do tend to do most things to a high standard which can actually be nice to be on the receiving end of. For example, when you go to their place for dinner, it is rare that you will be sitting around the house having pizza out of the box in your undies or eating last nights’ cold leftovers. More likely they will throw and amazing dinner party and not ask you to bring a plate or help clean up. Also, if you were to ask them to edit your essay or resume its likely that they will leave no stone unturned in this endeavour.
What I am saying is that having high standards for oneself does not have to be a bad thing in itself. It is just that one must know when to stop and take the pressure off oneself. It is great to want to do more than pizza out of the box when friends come over for tea, however if you insist on doing a whole host of intricate recipes on your own and end up frazzled and stressed out, and this grumpiness or anxiety effects your enjoyment of the night, then you have gone too far with it. And it is no fun feeling so anxious that you avoid others, or that you can’t talk through issues with a person which affects the intimacy of your relationships. So my advice is, do wonderful things but don’t put so much weight into it that you stop enjoying it. A bit of levity is important as life is there to be enjoyed. C’est la vie!!perfectwoman

Perfect Parenting

“To will to be that self which one truly is, is indeed the opposite of despair” — the despair of choosing “to be another than himself”. – Kierkegaard.

What do you imagine it would be like to be raised by a so called ‘perfect’ parent? Someone who never gets angry or lets you down, is always happy, never fails at anything or makes a mistake? Someone who is always completely loving? A parent who never gets upset when you track mud through the house or tells you to keep it down when you play the music too loud? A person who never has an argument with you or anyone else?

I can tell you that to be raised by a person such as this is a recipe for disaster. Why you may wonder? Let me explain…if you were raised by such a person, what do you think it would be like for you when you stepped out into the real world outside the family home, where people do get angry and let you down and make mistakes and have flaws etc. How would you cope? You’d have no experience of life where people are fallible. By way of lack of exposure to these things, you’d have no resilience to these hardships, you’d have had no ability to develop compassion for other people’s flaws and you’d have absolutely no conflict resolution skills. Not a good situation.
Donald Winnicott was a famous psychoanalyst and paediatrician in the 1960s whom was internationally renowned for his work with mothers and children. He stressed the concept of ‘good-enough mothering’ and he has written a book enititled, “ the ordinary devoted mother and her baby: To quote him:

“The foundations of health are laid down by the ordinary mother in her ordinary loving care of her own baby”

Winnicott also wrote about what he called the “false self” which he described as a defence or a kind of mask of behaviour that allows people to present a “polite and mannered attitude” in public. However, he saw more serious emotional problems in patients who could not remove this mask as they seemed unable to feel spontaneous, alive or real to themselves anywhere, in any part of their lives only managing to put on a successful “show of being real.” These people suffered from feelings of loneliness and emptiness. This I believe would be the inner world of the parent who tries to be perfect. So the child has a parent who is inwardly suffering and not able to be true and authentic with him/her.

The truth is, a child NEEDS their parent to be flawed so he or she can learn that that is part of the human condition and that it is ok for him or her to be flawed also. We all get angry, make mistakes, let people down, have weaknesses etc and we need to know that it is okay. This flawed self is actually the true self and this is the healthiest type of self-mothershood we have. It is when we try to hide this behind a mask that problems begin to arise. So please when you parent, it is really okay to be the beautiful flawed you!

Why I wrote Killing the Perfectionist Within

Book CoverThe idea for this book came from quite a few years of different experiences sort of weaving themselves together into an inspiration. Firstly I had my own energy crisis which I managed to heal from by piecing together my own little package of strategies. I had to unravel what was going wrong in my life that had lead me to that point. This unraveling taught me a lot. It taught me what had gone wrong and then I learned how to fix it. Once I did this I noticed I had lots of clients coming in to see me with similar issues. I then used what I had learned on my own healing journey to help them, and these things worked. So I wanted to write a handbook so I could reach more people with these techniques and insights, which although simple, are really powerful.
What  I realized was that there were a certain cluster of qualities that people with burnout often have such as:

  • Perfectionism
  •  High expectations of the self and possible of others too
  •  Low self- esteem
  •  Anxiety
  • An inability to allow themselves to rest or make a mistake without spiralling into depression or anxiety
  • A fear of conflict
  • Lots of guilt around letting others down
  • Huge anxiety about making a mistake
  •  A desire to be extremely independent and a dislike of asking for anyone for help
  • A struggle to be vulnerable
  • A deep seated belief about not being good enough.
  • People pleasing
  •  Struggles either to say yes or to say no
  •  Feels extremely anxious about being out of control

I believe that if these qualities are present in a person for a long enough period of time there is a high likelihood that burnout and maybe even Chronic Fatigue Syndrome will eventuate. This makes logical sense when you think about a person with extremely high standards pushing themselves hard without resting and never asking anyone to help them.
So what happened with me is that I was just tired all the time, I placed no value on resting and would not listen to my tired signs. It was all about achieving and pleasing and there was a lack of care there for myself. This has changed.

I now value rest extremely highly and it has made a huge difference. But it was not a simple road for me to obtain this understanding. I started with improving my diet, then I slowed down my pace of life as I realized that I was constantly over burdening myself. It was really hard to scale back and it took a lot of practice. It was hard to be assertive and say no to things as I thought people wouldn’t like me if I did, so it was all interlinked together into a bit of a mess, so slowly I unraveled it. And I wanted to share the knowledge of what I learned with you. Stay tuned until next week where I talk about perfectionism and parenting. Until then, love and light, Honor

About me

Hi! My name is Honor Jane Newman! Welcome to my blog! I am the author of the

Me
Me

self-help book Killing the Perfectionist Within as well as a psychologist and counsellor. I have been working with clients for about 10 years and have written two masters theses about health and well-being. I have also worked on the telephone counselling line at Lifeline Australia as well as in welfare and educational settings. I am always doing ongoing training to keep my skills fresh and up to do date. The latest training I have done is in art therapy with the focus on using artistic methods to help people unlock issues residing in their unconscious minds. I am really interested in working with the unconscious mind!!

Many women that come to see me for counseling feel a sense of isolation (having no one to talk to at a deep level) and a lack of emotional support in their lives. I felt there was not much I could do to help them to gain the extra social support they needed so I started up a monthly women’s group where they could gather together in a safe space and share their stories. This is  a very ancient practice and a very therapeutic thing for women to do.

I live in Melbourne, Australia, with my husband, son, daughter, fish and cat and live near the mountains, which I find very beautiful. If I did not live near the mountains I’d love to live near the beach. Then I think I’d get a dog and walk it on the sand every morning.

I love to do art, craft, cooking and reading to relax. I read tons of self-help books and I also like murder mysteries. I love travel and communing with nature. I’m also a fashion addict and am often rearranging my wardrobe and searching for interesting and versatile pieces of clothing, shoes and jewellery. With cooking I rarely make anything twice. I love planning my meals for the week and especially like vegan recipes.

I became a psychologist because I have been fascinated by people’s behaviour for as long as I can remember (before the age of 5 years), and I remember struggling through one of my mother’s psychology books as soon as I could read, fascinated and desperate to understand.

It was a dream come true to get into the psychology training course but the learning never stops and I know I still have so much to discover. I feel truly blessed to be a facilitator in helping people to move forward in their lives and I love connecting with other health professionals and hearing what they are doing to help others. They truly are beautiful selfless souls born on this earth with healing hearts, hands and minds.

With love and light, Honor

For more info about my work please visit: www.honornewman.com