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Maladaptive perfectionism is defined by an overwhelming fear of failure and an inability to accept mistakes, no matter how small. People with maladaptive perfectionism often set unrealistic goals or hold themselves to excessively high standards. When these standards are not met, they respond with harsh self-criticism and punitive thinking.
For example, a maladaptive perfectionist might continually restart a project to meet impossibly high expectations, leading to procrastination and missed deadlines. Over time, this cycle contributes to increased stress, depression, lower self-esteem, and poorer performance.
This chapter introduces strategies to help identify and challenge the automatic thoughts that reinforce perfectionistic behaviours.
Automatic Thoughts
Automatic thoughts are the spontaneous thoughts that pop into our minds without conscious control. For maladaptive perfectionists, these thoughts are often self-critical, rigid and negative – and they have a powerful effect on emotional wellbeing.
Learning to recognise these harmful thought patterns is an important first step in reducing their impact and breaking free from the perfectionism trap.
The relationship between thoughts, feelings, and behaviours
It is a common misconception that events directly cause our emotional and behavioural reactions. In reality, the way we think about an event or what we know as our ‘automatic thoughts’, plays a key role in shaping our feelings and subsequent actions.
An example of the relationship between thoughts, feelings and behaviours can be seen below:
Event
Mason received a score of 85% on his exam
Drake (a perfectionist) also received a score of 85% on his exam
Thoughts
He thought “wow I scored a good mark because of how hard I studied!”
He thought “wow I’m such a failure. I should have studied harder!”
Feelings
He felt proud of himself for scoring a high mark and was happy
He was disappointed that he wasn't able to achieve his goal of 90% and became angry with himself
Behaviours
He decided to reward himself for his good work and went out with friends.
He decided his score was unacceptable and cancelled plans with friends to stay home and study
In Drake’s response, we can identify several cognitive distortions that are common in maladaptive perfectionism:
Labelling: Calling himself a “failure”
Shoulding: Believing he should have done more.
Mental filtering: focusing only on what went wrong and ignoring his achievement
Challenging Harmful Thoughts: The ABC Analysis
Identifying situations where negative automatic thoughts are more likely to occur can help us prepare to minimise harmful thoughts and cognitions. The ABC Analysis is commonly utilised to help achieve this, and the steps are as follows:
A (activating event)
Firstly, write down a situation (activating event) that has made you feel unhappy or disappointed with yourself.
B (beliefs)
Secondly, try and recall the automatic thoughts (beliefs) that occurred immediately after the event.
C (consequences)
Lastly, write down what actions you performed and what feelings you felt (consequences) as a result of these beliefs.
For example:
A (activating event)
The girl I am tutoring for biology received a mark that did not meet the threshold she needed to be accepted into a special course
B (beliefs)
I thought I was stupid and believed it was my fault she didn't meet her goal. I thought that my teaching style should have been better.
C (consequences)
I apologised for letting her down and then handed in my letter of resignation to the tutoring company I worked for.
Now that you have identified your unhelpful negative thoughts, it is important to replace them with positive aspects of the situation that may have been ignored at the time. By doing so, you will be able to critically analyse how realistic your thoughts were at the time of the event and whether your expectations were too high.
Creating a written thought diary will make this process more easy to navigate, and will enable you to refer back to your work during challenging times.
Example of a thought diary:
A (Activating Event)
This can include actual events, situations, mental images, or a physical trigger
I was late to class this morning
B (Beliefs)
Ask yourself what you were thinking at the time. Highlight the most distressing thought and then rate how much you believe this thought is true (0-100)
I can’t believe I was late again
I must on time every day
I am so hopeless, lazy, and useless that I can't even do something as simple as being on time. (95%)
C (Consequences)
Write down how you felt at the time and highlight which emotion you think is most associated with the event. Rate the intensity of this emotion (0-100)
Annoyed
Frustrated
Disappointed (93%)
Recall what physical sensations you were feeling at the time and what actions you performed
I felt hot-flushes
My chest felt tight
Unhelpful Thinking Styles
Write down any unhelpful thinking styles you think you were using.
Labelling
Musting
Mental Filter
The Most Distressing Thought: I am so hopeless, lazy, and useless that I can't even do something as simple as being on time.
Evidence Supporting My Thought:
I was 20 minutes late to class I haven’t met any of my goals this past week
I ate some chips and didn't exercise
Evidence disproving my thought:
I have the best track record for being on time in my class
I keep up to date with all my study
I usually try to eat healthy and only snack occasionally
Examples of replacing the negative thought with a more realistic thought:
(It can be helpful to ask yourself what you would say to your friend if it was them experiencing this)
Being late to class on a small number of occasions doesn't mean I am always lazy
Sometimes there are things out of your control
Being late to class meant I could catch up on sleep I lost because of studying, which is important for health.
Punishing myself for a mistake will not help me feel better
Balanced thoughts: After examining the evidence supporting and disproving your most distressing thought, and having considered some realistic thoughts, replace the distressing thought with a more helpful one
It’s good that I want to be punctual but I can also show my dedication to my education by continuing to study and being alert during class.
Re-rate the most intense emotion from 0-100
57%
Re-rate how true you think your distressing thought is from 0-100
45%
Appendix
References
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