I’ve been thinking a bit about the relationship between Perfectionism, Fear-of-Failure, and Fear-of-Success, as I’ve been teaching them this week in my course.
They all have a very similar structure, where each has a component of a “shadow value”—something that’s important to us that we tend not to acknowledge, as well as a “acknowledged value”—something that we allow ourselves to acknowledge as important.
The solution for all 3 is similar—separate the shadow value from the known value, then figure out if each value (both shadow and known) actually applies to the situation, and how best to apply it.
For Perfectionism, the Shadow Value is pleasing/being loved by/being accepted by others. The acknowledged value is having high standards for ourselves and our work.
For Fear-of-Failure, the Shadow Value is protecting our identity. The acknowledged value is dealing with the negative external consequences of failure.
For Fear-of-Success, the Shadow Value is being deserving of what we receive. The acknowledged value is dealing with the negative external consequences of success.
What bugs me is… I don’t know why all 3 of these happen to develop this very similar structure. It could just be a coincidence, but my gut tells me there is something unifying all 3 of these items together that I’m not seeing, and that understanding what it is would give me a more complete understanding of Procrastination.
They all seem to somehow be related to “Standards”—but I’m still not seeing the underlying system.
I’m not sure if the perfectionism case (being perfect to please others) fits the identity pattern. Although admittedly, in some people the shadow/acknowledged value is flipped—some people will acknowledge being perfect to please others, but won’t acknowledge the part of themselves that want to do it for themselves.
Thinking that some things aren’t all right to acknowledge might be more fundamental.
I was guessing that “all of the shadow stuff is about how people think of themselves (i.e. identity. I am _, I am not _.) because it’s something people get tied up in, and it’s a reason someone might want to deny something.
I also think of Perfectionism (and it’s opposites, not trying (if the standard is unobtainable*)) as being (related to) fear of failure.
*This might cash out as:
“I’m good at X” → does well, puts in a lot of effort (Maybe judges people for having low standards, or has different personal standards, whether high, nonjudgemental, distributed, etc.), may seek it out + challenges in domain
I’ve been thinking a bit about the relationship between Perfectionism, Fear-of-Failure, and Fear-of-Success, as I’ve been teaching them this week in my course.
They all have a very similar structure, where each has a component of a “shadow value”—something that’s important to us that we tend not to acknowledge, as well as a “acknowledged value”—something that we allow ourselves to acknowledge as important.
The solution for all 3 is similar—separate the shadow value from the known value, then figure out if each value (both shadow and known) actually applies to the situation, and how best to apply it.
For Perfectionism, the Shadow Value is pleasing/being loved by/being accepted by others. The acknowledged value is having high standards for ourselves and our work.
For Fear-of-Failure, the Shadow Value is protecting our identity. The acknowledged value is dealing with the negative external consequences of failure.
For Fear-of-Success, the Shadow Value is being deserving of what we receive. The acknowledged value is dealing with the negative external consequences of success.
What bugs me is… I don’t know why all 3 of these happen to develop this very similar structure. It could just be a coincidence, but my gut tells me there is something unifying all 3 of these items together that I’m not seeing, and that understanding what it is would give me a more complete understanding of Procrastination.
They all seem to somehow be related to “Standards”—but I’m still not seeing the underlying system.
Is the shadow value always identity related? (You are good/[identity X which is good]/not? Perception/model of self worth?)
I’m not sure if the perfectionism case (being perfect to please others) fits the identity pattern. Although admittedly, in some people the shadow/acknowledged value is flipped—some people will acknowledge being perfect to please others, but won’t acknowledge the part of themselves that want to do it for themselves.
Thinking that some things aren’t all right to acknowledge might be more fundamental.
I was guessing that “all of the shadow stuff is about how people think of themselves (i.e. identity. I am _, I am not _.) because it’s something people get tied up in, and it’s a reason someone might want to deny something.
I also think of Perfectionism (and it’s opposites, not trying (if the standard is unobtainable*)) as being (related to) fear of failure.
*This might cash out as:
“I’m good at X” → does well, puts in a lot of effort (Maybe judges people for having low standards, or has different personal standards, whether high, nonjudgemental, distributed, etc.), may seek it out + challenges in domain
“I’m bad at Y” → doesn’t try, scrapes by, avoids/ugh field/procrastinates, says ‘it doesn’t matter’/‘i don’t care’, judges self, maybe dirty pain
(It’s not super easy to delineate ‘enjoys/seeks out thing’ from (consistently) ‘works to get better at it’.)