Perfectionism: A Blessing Or A Curse?

Perfectionism:
a personal standard, attitude, or philosophy that demands perfection and rejects anything less.

Perfectionist:
1. a person who adheres to or believes in perfectionism.
a person who demands perfection of himself, herself, or others.

2.

I KNEW I was in the dictionary under perfectionist.

For those who don’t share this state of mind, I am here to enlighten you. I believe that I was born this way. And now I am singing the Lady Gaga song.

From a little girl I needed things a certain way. Never once in my young life was I asked to make my bed. When I was tall enough to do it, I just did. Every day.

I remember straightening up my mother’s things, turning off lights in vacant rooms and realigning anything that seemed to be off-center or out of correct formation. I already needed balance in my life.

Imagine my mother’s elation. She is the opposite of a perfectionist. Who WAS this little person cleaning the house at age four?

As I got older I focused less on the entire house and more on my room. My space. My room always looked like a place where no one lived. My books were aligned perfectly. No clutter sat on my dresser. Anything that I disturbed had to be returned to its proper spot as soon as I was finished.

As a teenager I hand washed and vacuumed my car every single Saturday without fail. No matter what. It had to be done.

I wasn’t trying to impress anyone. This was all about me. It was required to keep my brain quiet.

Everyone told me that one day I would have kids and all of that perfectionism nonsense would go out the window. I would have much bigger things to worry about.

I have four. It did not.

I will admit that I have adapted since I have much more to manage now. I have a new list of requirements. I no longer hand wash my car every week. The hubby is responsible for everything outside of the house. And the garage. And since my suv sits in the garage, it is now his responsibility.

My hubby has a life and does not succumb to the madness. My vehicle hangs out in soccer fields. Hand washing it every Saturday is not going to happen. But he does run it trough the automatic wash occasionally. I’m okay with that.

Perfectionism is different for different people. What is important to me, may not be important to others. For instance most of the time my house is NOT sterile clean. However it is 100% in order. Or at least an order that makes sense to me.

Let’s say you were to walk over to my bookshelves. If you look closely you will see dust all over everything. I hate dusting crap that just sits around. All I care about is that the crap that sits around is properly placed, aligned and balanced. That makes my brain happy.

If you look in my pantry, things will always be forward facing and stacked according to size. Back when I used to buy baby food, even those little jars had to be separated properly and placed in straight lines, labels forward. Perfect alignment.

That’s normal. Right?

All of the beds have to be made every morning. If that is not the case I will think of nothing else until it is done. However, every now and again, if it is really cold out or rainy and I know that we are not going to be leaving the house, I will call a lazy day.

On lazy days I walk into each kid’s room, acknowledge the unmade bed, as if by doing so I have made peace with the idea. The unmade beds are NOT going to taught me all day. Then I exit, not to return until the bedtime tuck-in routine.

Crazy? Surely not.

I will get up off the comfy couch to straighten a crooked picture on the wall. Or straighten a pillow in a chair. Or to clean fingerprints off of the stainless steel fridge.

What idiot thought shiny, silver appliances were a good idea? And why do I buy them?

In my closet everything has to be put away in the proper section. Unlike some people I do not require color coordination. Well, except for my husbands button downs. I do like those grouped by color.

My clothes are arranged like so: cotton tank tops, short sleeve t-shirts, camis and sleeveless shirts, short sleeve shirts, athletic, long sleeve t-shirts, long sleeve shirts, sweaters, blazers, dresses, crop pants, pants, jeans and finally, jeans I hope to fit into one day.

Oh and I like for each plastic hanger to be a fingers width from the next one. I will spend time in the closet some days doing nothing but making sure that is the case.

That’s not weird. Right?

If I have things that I know needs to get done I obsess over them until they are completed. Floors need to be mopped once a week. On floor day I can not relax until the floors are done.

But once those floors are finished I get a little high from the satisfaction.

That is right. Moping floors makes me high. So what.

My poor husband gets drug into my madness as well. Heaven forbid a honey-do list is constructed. I cannot rest until it is completed. My hubby does not share my burning desire to cross clean out the gutters off the list. Most of the time he just does it to shut me up.

While it may seem to the outsider a pretty awesome problem to have, let me assure you that being a perfectionist isn’t always roses. My brain never let’s me rest. I’m always scanning for something to do. Relax is a word that I have a hard time subscribing to.

No matter how hard you work to keep your brain satisfied, life continues to happen all around you. You will never be able to cross everything off your ever-changing list.

What about you? Are you a perfectionist? What do YOU have to get done before you can go about your day?

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