Perfectionism is a tendency to demand extremely high standards of performance and flawlessness from oneself and others. Both genetics and environmental factors can contribute towards perfectionist tendencies. Childhood abuse, neglect or traumatic experiences can make us internalize feelings of shame and not being good enough. Shame, however, is a difficult emotion to sit with and there are many covers for shame. Perfectionism is also one of the covers for toxic shame where an individual through perfectionism unconsciously avoids their deep-rooted feelings of not being good enough / worthlessness.
Perfectionism is different from healthy striving for excellence as it can take over our lives by an individual setting unrealistic high standards for self, harsh self-criticism and leaving no room for mistakes or to breathe. Perfectionism can negatively impact our relationship with others, our self and even our creator Allah Subhan Tallah.
Consider the example of Salma, 35 years old, who grew up with a strict father and a highly critical mother. Throughout her school years, she used to feel uncool and just not good enough. She also felt very alone in her experience as her parents were quite disconnected from her internal struggles due to their ongoing marital issues with each other. Salma eventually found her worth in high grades and started feeling pride in her intelligence and remarkable grades. Even though she was able to find her worth temporarily in grades and her academic achievements, she had a harsh internal critic who expected perfection in everything she did however no matter how hard Salma tried her internal critic was never satisfied. She judged herself for not being a good Muslim, mother and woman. While her perfectionist tendencies ensured she did everything with a lot of diligence and excellence however it all started taking a toll on her as there was no room for her to just breathe and be.
Due to her being very self-critical, she cannot appreciate or feel gratitude for the acts of worship or good deeds she was already doing but kept feeling bad for what she was not doing. When she had internally no permission to make mistakes and fail, it was difficult for her to accept her growing edges wholeheartedly, therefore making her feel increasingly resentful towards religion. Due to her adverse childhood experiences, she saw Allah as a persecutory object who was only focused on what she was not doing yet and how that meant she was bad, and religion was harsh.
Perfectionism also impacts our relationships with others negatively sometimes due to the tendency to find faults in others. Parents with perfectionist tendencies constantly obsess over their children. While they think they are trying to improve them by highlighting their flaws and constantly pushing them to improve further. The downside to this is that children often end up internalizing feelings not good enough and sometimes rebel against their parents’ ideals of growth imposed on them which can often feel like attempts to control. Maladaptive perfectionism makes parents too focused on grades and outcomes to the point that parents sometimes are unable to see their children’s internal struggles, interests and what they need.
Khadija grew up being scapegoated as a child in her family and had a history of emotional and physical abuse by her caregivers growing up. There was constant judgement, criticism and rejection of her appearance and personality and no healthy expression of feelings like anger was permitted in the family. As a parent due to her perfectionist tendencies she wanted her son to do as well as her more compliant, studious elder son. She was trying to control and micromanage him so he could get good grades, however, her son felt suffocated and shamed by all the taunts and attempts to control. It eventually put a strain on their relationship and her son’s rebellion only increased.
Perfectionism also affects our relationship with ourselves and can take a toll on our mental health. It makes us want to be more than human. With perfectionism often comes fear of failure, procrastination, avoidance and all-or-nothing rigid thinking. It also leads to feelings of inadequacy as the unreasonably high expectations are difficult to meet. And even if it is met, those with perfectionist tendencies will find some other aspect or area to self-criticize or jump onto the next goal to achieve to feel worthy.
While striving for growth and improvement is desirable and leads us towards our goals and dreams, perfectionism leads us towards despair, anxiety and unnecessary criticism of the self and others. Allah Subhan Tallah does not expect us to be more than human and acknowledges the human tendency to make mistakes by opening the doors of repentance for us and loving those who genuinely repent. “Indeed Allah loves those who are constantly repentant” (al Baqarah, 222). Ultimate perfection belongs only to Allah Subhan Tallah.
Cultivating self-awareness of our patterns of self and other judgement, rigid all-or-nothing thinking, constant comparison with others etc through self-reflection or through sitting with a therapist is important when addressing perfectionism especially when it’s rooted in trauma. Also important is accepting our imperfect ‘self’ and permitting ourselves to be human. Self-acceptance doesn’t mean that we don’t improve and grow further in our life journey rather it means having a compassionate stance towards ourselves as we continue to work on our growing edges while also acknowledging and cherishing our achievements and strengths. It means while we continue to strive to be better Muslims and human beings we also allow ourselves to feel gratitude for the good deeds we already are doing by the blessing and mercy of Allah on us. It also means not attaching our children’s entire worth to their grades and achievements but seeing and celebrating them for their own unique individual personalities. Neither we nor our children need to be perfect. As we become more kind towards ourselves it becomes easier to be kind and compassionate towards our children. As we acknowledge our humanness it becomes easier to self-reflect on our weaknesses or shadow self and work on them instead of projecting them onto others or going into despair due to internal beating up of self.
*All characters are fictitious amalgams used to exemplify real-life common situations.
MashaAllah. It was a comprehensive piece about perfectionism since you added vignettes of perfectionistic personalities. You may need to show the personality of the Prophet Muhammad, as an example of one who operates at the level of Ehsan but not perfectionism. Muslims must aspire to Ehsan. After all, within Ehsan, you perform at a higher standard because you feel Allah is watching you. Allah swt the Merciful, the Compassionate is the Judge and not you. The Prophet’s life was not easy but he was never depressed, anxious nor despairing like what we see among perfectionist people. He was in gratitude all the time and his performance was impeccable – the greatest man ever, husband, father, warrior, leader etc.
MashaAllah sister. You have spoken the truth. Ehsan is a great concept that helps us understand what is true excellence through the prophetic example. Sallahu alaihi wa sallam
There is a tendency in western society, to go into the perfectiontrap subhana Allah. This can also be the focus on age and young age, that always will end in a way. To focus on Allahs perfection and that the prophet (saws) is the best human being, and that Allah loves us the most when we repent and that the best person is the one with the most taqwa. Mash Allah, our religion is an endless cure to all symtoms of societies imperfection. Insh Allah khayr, may Allah ease everything. Thank you for your blog. It helps to think about it. And to try to leave it behind. Not to bring it forward to the next generation.
My personal journey, it was during marriage and having children that made me end up in these thoughts of imperferfection, and evan if i knew, there is no human being perfect, i felt less worthy. It was very painful subhana Allah
SubhanAllah, this is such an important topic. I’ve been struggling with shame and have recently come to realise I do use perfectionism as a coping strategy. I love what you said about being more than human. I was actually thinking about that today prior to reading this piece. Perfectionism, in a way, is believing we can be more than human, which essentially means we are forgetting Gods superiority and His power, because perfectionism is all about control, and all control belongs to Allah. A great read, thanks for sharing.