Three ways perfectionism is the heart of social anxiety
Plus three simple mindset shifts to ease both
If you liked my first book, How to Be Yourself, and found it helpful for social anxiety, I think you’ll love How to Be Enough. That’s because perfectionism is inextricably linked to social anxiety in at least three ways:
Commonality #1: We think a superb performance is the key to being liked.
This is the big one. Perfectionism is “interpersonally motivated,” meaning it’s driven by our relationships to other people. In both social anxiety and perfectionism, we think we have to deliver a superb performance to belong.
But because our standards for “superb” are unrealistically high—I can’t sound stupid, I have to look and feel confident, Everyone should like me—we get overwhelmed and flip-flop from “all” to “nothing,” and end up staying home, quiet, or checked out.
But think about this:
Why do you like your friends? Is it because they do things superbly? Are they articulate, confident, tell good jokes, or have good taste? Maybe a little, but mostly not. Probably, you like them because of how you feel when you’re with them: comfortable, relaxed, and like you don’t have to perform at all.
Here's the key: assume they feel the same way about you. They like you for being you, not your social performance.
Bottom line: if we’re focused on delivering a superb social performance (or, more accurately, avoiding coming off as cringey and weird), we’re focused on ourselves. Instead, focus on the people you’re with. Listen. Connect. Focus outward on the moment rather than inward on delivering a superb performance.
Commonality #2: We worry about making mistakes (and when we do make one, it sticks with us).
Woe is us when we text the wrong person, tell a joke that nobody gets, or bungle the Zoom connection while the whole staff waits.
And if someone actually notices and says something? Mortifying. We might even cringe at the memory decades later.
But think about this:
Mistakes are only mortifying if we think we’re never allowed to make any.
Allowing yourself even a 1% error rate gives you infinitely more room to breathe than allowing yourself zero errors, ever. It’s not about convincing yourself the mistake doesn’t matter—screwing up still feels bad. Instead, it is coming to the wise and magnanimous understanding that mistakes are an inevitable part of the package deal of being human and alive. Expecting a few mistakes is more effective than trying to avoid them all.
Commonality #3: We address perceived insufficiencies by overcompensating.
If we’re trying to hide our perceived insufficiencies (People will think I’m stupid; They’ll see I don’t know what I’m doing; I can’t be awkward), we might react by over-preparing, overtraining, overstudying, overcleaning, overcommitting, overexplaining, or over-rehearsing. We might show up overdressed, be overly friendly, and hold ourselves to overly ethical standards.
But then, when nothing goes wrong, our overcompensation gets the credit. We never get the chance to learn we were sufficient all along without the overcompensation.
But think about this:
Letting go of overcompensation doesn’t have to be all-or-nothing. Don’t flip from overpreparation to totally winging it or overcommitting to saying no to everything. Instead, roll it back just a little: from overpreparation to preparation, overcommitting to committing.
Might you still want to go overboard from time to time? Of course! But go all out because you want to, not just as a buffer against failure. Instead of compensating out of fear, go all-out when it’s important or meaningful to you.
If you found this post useful, there’s a lot more in How to Be Enough: Self-Acceptance for Self-Critics and Perfectionists, coming January 7, 2025. And hey, there’s a preorder button right there!
Whether you’ve been here since day one or you just discovered this newsletter yesterday, I’m glad you’re here!
Be kind to others and yourself!
