perfection not required

By Jazmine H

Perfectionism: “The tendency to demand of others or of oneself an extremely high or even flawless level of performance, in excess of what is required by the situation,” according to the APA (American Psychological Association).

The feeling of needing to be perfect is something I have tried to ignore for five years now. 

Since the beginning of 7th grade, my brain has told me that unless something is done perfectly, it's all wrong. Despite hearing my teachers say “It's okay to make mistakes, we need them to learn,” I couldn't comprehend that. I understood the phrase but couldn't accept it no matter how hard I tried to. 

In my eyes, if a mistake was found in my work, I failed. If my teachers gave me anything below a 90%, my eyes saw a 0%. 

I'm not alone in this though. According to an article by Newportacaadamy.com, between 25% and 30% of teens suffer from “maladaptive perfectionism,” which means striving for unrealistic perfection to the point of causing them pain.

It wasn't always this bad for me though. In fact, it wasn't until sophomore year that I noticed how high my standards for myself were. 

In middle school, I tried to get the best grades possible but I did not demand it. If I saw a low score, I told myself I can do better next time. During freshman year, everything was online so the standards I was held to were simply to show up. Sophomore year, however, it's like something in my brain clicked and I was no longer happy with “my best.” If my best wasn't perfect then it wasn't good enough. 

I would internally scold myself after seeing my grades if they were any lower than an “A.” Even if my teacher said I did fantastic, if I didn't see a 100, I did horribly. 

I wondered, if my teachers were not even holding me up to a standard this high, why was I doing this to myself? Who taught me that perfection is the only option? Turns out it was my own friends, family, and peers. People I used to know or people who claimed they only wanted the best for me. 

According to an article by Newportacaadamy.com, “Researchers have determined there is a genetic component to perfectionism, reinforced by behavior learned from perfectionistic parents. But a greater influence comes from environmental factors.”

I used to think it was only natural to feel more competitive as you grow older since it isn’t a secret that there are people smarter than you in many subjects. I also didn't seem to think it wasn't normal to think like this since my parents have always had high standards, especially my dad.

It truly hit me how high my standards were when no matter how many people told me a story I had written was amazing and done perfectly, I couldn't accept it. It wasn't only my teacher telling me it was great but it was also multiple peers saying that too. 

No matter how hard I tried to see the greatness they saw, all I saw was trash, failure, disappointment. 

My brain would almost always alter the words “this is a great story” to “I feel bad for you so I'm going to say it’s good, but this is truly a terrible story.”

I would end up re-writing the whole thing. My brain made me restart it multiple times until it saw something it was mildly okay with. 

That experience along with a couple of others helped me realize that this was doing way more damage than I truly thought. I realized that crying over an assignment or a grade wasn't actually okay, since I did not show people that I didn't know that it was bad to feel this. 

I've been trying to come to terms with imperfections and making mistakes. It may take a good while but I'm hoping I can get rid of these feelings eventually. I know this won't be something that changes overnight and will take a lot of trial and error. 

I know in order to get rid of these feelings, I will need to put myself first and stop asking people what they think about my work.  

If I'm happy with the way something turns out but someone says it sucks, I need to not let that keep me up at night. 

I also need to make sure I take what they say into consideration. If more than two people say something is good, I need to try and see what they see, not only focus on the negatives. 

I'm slowly but surely adding these things into my life. The main thing is I'm really trying to learn that it's okay to fail and there will always be at least one thing you are going to struggle with. I need to know that that's okay and bound to happen. 

For the Warrior Times, this is Jazmine Heredia.