When striving, over-giving, or needing to always be “good enough” comes at a cost.
Have you ever wondered about the internal and external factors that drive your behaviours? Do you have a hard time saying “no” to people out of fear of disappointing them or them leaving? Do you find that you easily move from one task to the next without ever giving yourself recognition or a chance to slow down? Do you often tell yourself that you can manage busy schedules, others’ needs, and that you “thrive under pressure”? Do mistakes often feel heavy , shameful, and result in a lack of self-compassion and more expectations for oneself?
Often times struggling with people pleasing or perfectionism can look like:
Difficulty saying no or setting boundaries
Fear of disappointing others and fear of failure
Harsh inner criticism and shame
Feeling responsible for others’ emotions
Never feeling “good enough,” even when you try hard
Consistently “going with the flow” to appease and “keep the peace”
Fearful of communication and confrontation
Neglecting self-care and feeling burnout
People pleasing and perfectionism often begin as adaptive mechanisms to stay safe, valued, or connected. But over time, they leave you feeling exhausted, anxious, disconnected from yourself and fearful of the others and the world around you. The goals become striving for the next “best thing” and must be flawlessly executed every time because somewhere along the way your value and worth became tied to pleasing others. Every risk now feels too overwhelming and too great of a cost that it leaves you frozen in place.
“When you say yes to others, make sure you are not saying no to yourself.”
- Paulo Coelho
Therapy at Akin helps you explore these patterns and cycles with compassion, not with self-criticism or shame.
Therapy can support you in:
Understanding where these patterns come from by exploring and processing early experiences and innate safety mechanisms
Softening the parts that use self-judgment and shame to set expectations of self
Building boundary setting skills and improving assertive communication skills
Reconnecting with your own needs and values
Developing a more self-compassionate inner voice
Highlighting and acknowledging inherent strengths that are often overlooked
Akin Approaches to Navigating People Pleasing & Perfectionism
We focus on using approaches which foster a stronger sense of self-compassion and self-trust while reconnecting with the idea that your needs matter.
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We will begin to explore early and past experiences which allows us to better understand where patterns such as self-criticism, fears of disappointment, abandonment, and failure began and how they shape your expectations of self.
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Parts work provides a compassionate approach to exploring what striving for perfection or pleasing others protects us from and what they fear.
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ACT will allow us to hold space for uncomfortable feelings such as anxiety, guilt, or shame to exist without the need to avoid or distract ourselves or immediately “fix” the situation while also living a life that matters to you.
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DBT skills assist with the emotion regulation and interpersonal skills needed to communicate needs and begin to set boundaries in one-sided relationship dynamics.
“Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving to be your best. Perfectionism is believing that if you live perfectly, you can avoid pain.”
-Brené Brown
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Therapy can be a place to slow down, breathe, and feel understood—without needing to perform, please, or explain everything perfectly.