In today’s society we are brainwashed to believe that we need to be absolutely “perfect” in every way; perfect body, perfect family, perfect education, perfect house, perfect career… perfect life. Anything that doesn’t live up to these expectations is considered “less than”.
In a world that focuses all of its energy, time and money on being absolutely “perfect”, what do you do when you fall short of these unrealistic expectations?
In essence, these standards of perfection that are set by others we see in social media, television, and the media will unintentionally become the standards you set for yourself. What do you do when you feel like you’re letting yourself and everyone else around you down?
For me, I spiral into anxiety. I worry about those around me and the judgements they make. What they think of me. Even though they may be unaware of my failure to meet my own expectations, I feel like it’s something that people can see written all over me clear as day, like a giant tattoo on my face.
I don’t leave the house. I wonder what other people are saying about me behind my back. I overthink everything in my head on repeat asking for constant reassurance until it drives me and my family insane. The intrusive thoughts keep coming as I go down one rabbit hole to the next thinking of different scenarios and things people are believing about me that may be untrue.
I feel sick to my stomach, nauseous at the thought of facing anyone again and worry about what this will do to my reputation. Would they even believe me if I told them the truth? Much like the aforementioned metaphorical tattoo on my face, my failures feel like something I can’t hide people from seeing.
Perfectionism is just that. Not being able to cope when things fall short of being “perfect”. The definition of perfect can vary from one person to the next depending on what someone considers, in their mind, is ideal.
Things like the way your life is portrayed on social media or the way you look in pictures is the modern way of expressing yourself to the world that opens you up to judgement and criticism from other people. Not only those in your social circles, but quite literally, the entire world. If you fall short of your ideal standards, you can turn to anxiety and depression at the thought of how people view you and what they think about you.
This is how social anxiety and perfectionism couple together perfectly (see what I did there). Feeling like you’ve fallen short of your high standards and ideals is the perfect storm for social anxiety.
As humans we want to be accepted by our peers. To get along and be seen as a “member of the pack”. In social situations whether it be at work, school, group events, dates or new encounters, we aim to show people the greatest versions of ourselves. Often times this means looking and feeling our best as well as going along with conversations and maybe, sometimes, exaggerating details about our lives and interests.
Have you ever been on a date where someone has said they’re really into something, for example: camping, and you go along with it because you went camping that one time and it wasn’t so bad? You tell them you love the great outdoors and hiking when in reality, you could actually give or take the idea of spending time outside in nature. That’s what I call exaggerating the narrative. In this situation you want to seem appealing to the other person so you try to seem perfectly aligned with their interests.
Now imagine being like this all the time. Social Anxiety means sometimes focusing more on people pleasing and less on being your true authentic self. You want to seem perfect to everyone around you even if that means going along with things you may not like, believe or care about.
Wanting to be seen as the ideal person, friend or colleague all the time can be exhausting and take a very large emotional toll, especially once you are finally all alone and it’s time to start replaying every conversation in your head on repeat making sure you met all of your expectations for the day.
After going over every word, phrase and comment you said during the day, low and behold you stumble across one tiny flaw in something you said. Now what? Here comes the anxiety, gut wrenching panic and self-loathing.
You feel like you didn’t meet the imagined expectations set by you and your peers and now, because of this tiny flaw (that probably no one even thought twice about), you worry it has diminished their entire opinion of you. You start to overthink and wonder if they no longer like you and will go around telling everyone of the mistake you made.
You sit alone in your home and let fear take hold as you overthink for hours on end, losing sleep and in a constant state of fight or flight worrying about how to best approach this situation the next day if/when you see them again.
Fight or flight is an instinct we’ve had passed down to us over generations as a way for our body to function efficiently during extremely stressful situations. It used to be a way for us to jump into survival mode appropriately when we feel physically threatened by predators. People who suffer from anxiety actually go through the fight or flight responses much more frequently as even the thought of stressors and triggers can set you into this response without actually being in real danger.
Fight or flight causes an increase in adrenaline in the body which means that the heart jumps into action at the increase of cortisol which speeds up the heart rate and the blood pumping throughout the body and to the organs. Always being in a constant state of fight or flight can actually have negative effects on the heart and other organs in the body. Eventually this could lead to heart complications and issues earlier in life.
This is how someone struggling with social anxiety can feel when they also have issues with perfectionism. They need to constantly feel like they are liked and accepted by their peers and anything less than that leads into a tail spin of anxious behaviours and emotional self-abuse.
Often times people who struggle with social anxiety also struggle with low self-worth, self-esteem issues, and low self-confidence. Ways you can work on social anxiety and perfectionism struggles are:
-Communication: communicate with those around you. If you feel like you may have crossed a line or said something they may not have liked, ASK. Then you know for sure and don’t have to spend your time worrying about it later.
-Remind yourself that other people have their own struggles they are also dealing with. No one is perfect.
-Remember you are not the centre of everyone’s universe: It may be hard to hear, but not everything revolves around you, and that’s a good thing! The one thing you said that you’re so worried about, the other person probably forgot about it after the conversation was over. People don’t dwell on the things you say as much as you think they do.
-Try and focus on the positives: You probably said a thousand things right! The conversation was flowing, you had a good time. Focus on all the things that went right in your social interactions instead of the one thing that (probably didn’t) go wrong.
-Seek help: If you are in a constant state of fight or flight due to your anxiety whether it be social or general anxiety, not sleeping, or feel a decrease in your self-worth, see someone professionally to help work on strategies to cope. It’s not healthy for you or your heart to never have a break.
This is the first post in my Social Anxiety series where I plan to go over the relationship between social anxiety and other mental health related disorders.
Stay tuned for the next post in this series and thank you for reading!
The Socially Awkward Normie 