Getting over the “I’m a perfectionist” excuse

In my last blog post, I shared why perfectionism is so detrimental to your health, happiness, and yes, your waistline…  https://www.tanjashaw.com/perfectionism-part-one/. 

Here, I’m going to share some of my best tips to overcome this tendency. 

1. First, understand that overcoming perfectionism can be hard. It requires you to stop hiding behind the convenient excuse of being all or nothing. It requires you to actually go out and do something rather than stay comfortably stuck behind the make-believe roadblock of unreasonable expectations. And that my friend is uncomfortable.
2. Realize that a perfectionist tendency is simply that – a tendency. It is not part of your identity. It’s simply a habit you’ve been practicing for quite some time, but you have the power to begin building new habits instead.
3. Swap the all-or-nothing habit for the all-or-something mindset. If you make a mistake on your journey, get into the practice of returning to the path you want to be on as quickly as possible. Practice gentleness and kindness. The more you practice this, the more it will become, well, your practice. Be on the lookout for the sneaky ways the all-or-nothing mindset creeps in. For example, waiting until vacation is over to ‘get back on track’ or skipping your afternoon walk because you only have 10 minutes.
4. Start working on deeper beliefs. Perfectionism comes from deeper beliefs that we aren’t enough as we are, or what makes us good enough is what others think of us. This is not a one-and-done action. This is an ongoing practice that will take some time, but when we can work through those limiting beliefs, the rest of the process becomes so much easier.
5. Practice new thoughts to support your new mindset. One of my favourites, borrowed from the book Soundtracks by Jon Acuff is ‘momentum is messy’. I also use “good enough is good enough” and “version done is better than version none”. In fact, I used those mantras a lot when creating the Fit + Vibrant Planner!

Remember, perfectionism is not the gold standard, it’s an impossible standard. The more you can shift away from it, the more consistent, peaceful and happy you’ll be on your journey toward your best health.