How Perfectionism and People Pleasing Lead to Burnout

If I haven’t already told you, I do want you to know that the topics I talk about, write about, teach about are all topics I work on or have worked on myself. I’m not some special unicorn that has life all figured out, I’m right here with you in the trenches doing the work. This topic specifically I have plenty of experience with, and have worked through so much of what held me back for so long. I also want you to know that sometimes what I say might sting a little….or a lot. Just know that it always comes from a place of love for you. I wouldn’t want you to leave my presence, social media or pages of a blog without telling you what you might need to hear to change your life.

If you are a self proclaimed perfectionist, or pride yourself on always putting others needs before your own, you may consider these a good thing. Honorable traits driving you to demand excellence of yourself and others. I believed this for decades not realizing the detrimental side of the all or nothing thinking that can go along with perfectionism. Or you may not yet have experienced the soul sucking effects of these behaviors. I have, and in a big way, which is why I’m here writing this to you. If I can save even one person from feeling like the empty, hollow, broken shell of the human you once were, then my time here is very well spent.

If you’re not a perfectionist or people pleaser, then by all means go forth and enjoy the freedom from these insidious beasts. But, before you go, you may want to take a quick look at ‘How do I know if I’m a perfectionist or a people pleaser’ below. You might be surprised to find yourself in this list.

A little back story on how I lost my soul to what seem to be very altruistic attributes, but left untreated, can be wreaking havoc on your internal world and eventually your life. My unidentified and untreated perfectionism and people pleasing ultimately culminated in me feeling like an empty shell of the person I once was, like something broke inside of me that I didn’t have the mental, emotional, or physical strength left to try and fix. I don’t say this to be overdramatic, this was exactly my experience after decades of pouring from an empty cup. This hollow, empty, hopeless, brokenness, ended up being the catalyst to me desperately searching for answers. I ready every self help book I could get my hands on, watched all the Ted Talks, read inspirational quotes and anything else I could think of to refill, refuel, heal and hopefully return to the person I once was. I now realize that returning to that previous version of me would have resulted in more of the same. Thankfully I wasn’t able to find a way to do that. But, what I did find over time were tools for managing my mental and emotional health, tools that seemed simple and not especially impactful at the time, but would change the entire trajectory of my life and fill me with more peace, love, and joy and purpose than I could have imagined. Allowing me to reconnect with my inner wisdom, with the highest, wisest version of myself and to find the unconditional love and freedom I so desperately craved. (Pro tip: It was within me all along, I just didn’t know how to access it). Ok, that was kind of a lot of backstory, I digress…

So how do you know if you have perfectionistic or people pleasing traits?

Now that we’ve identified that pretty much all of us have at least some traits of each, let’s get into what we can do to prevent these tendencies from sucking the life out of us.

The first step is always awareness, we can’t change what we can’t see. So you’re already well on your way after reading above and identifying any signs you may present with according to our table above. Good job!

Secondly, we need to remove any judgement and/or harsh criticism of ourselves for any behaviors we’ve noted. This one can be tough since harsh judgement and criticism are part of the package. Again, just noticing when you are judging can be very powerful. Think about how you would treat a friend or loved one who may display some of these behaviors, and approach yourself with the same grace.

Third, get support while you navigate healing, understanding, and loving yourself into the version of you that is ok with failing, the version of you that prioritizes herself and fills her own cup first, the version of you that shows up for herself with kindness and compassion, and the version of you that can finally go after your big dreams because the fear of failure is no longer holding you back from getting out there and getting it done!

I am profoundly and deeply changed by doing this work in ways that are hard to quantify, it’s hard to capture in words the deep sense of peace, and freedom and self trust I feel now, the calm and certain connection to my inner knowing, my inner wisdom, which was there all along I just couldn’t hear it over the self doubt, self questioning, constant work to know enough, do enough, prioritizing anyone and everyone else over myself and yet still judging myself, criticizing myself, spending countless hours lying awake running through all the ways I had ‘failed’.

I also feel a deep sense of sadness and regret for all the years I mistreated the girl in me who just wanted to ‘be good’, who could never seem to do enough, who feared my judgement most of all. She and I have made peace and now play for the same team, and thankfully she has forgiven me for what I did not know.

I invite you to join me in the freedom from the relentless pursuit of perfection and approval, and instead find a sense of fulfillment in embracing our true selves. The paradox of life is that we chase perfection and miss the raw beauty of our perfectly imperfect life.

XO