The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control

Informationen zum Autor Katherine Morgan Schafler is a psychotherapist, writer and speaker, and former on-site therapist at Google. She earned degrees and trained at UC Berkeley and Columbia University, with post-graduate certification from the Association for Spirituality and Psychotherapy in NYC. Klappentext Selected for USA Today' s Best Books of 2023 Selected as Editor's Pick in Amazon's Best Books of 2023 From psychotherapist Katherine Morgan Schafler, an invitation to every recovering perfectionist to challenge the way they look at perfectionism, and the way they look at themselves. We've been looking at perfectionism all wrong. As psychotherapist and former on-site therapist at Google Katherine Morgan Schafler argues in The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control , you don't have to stop being a perfectionist to be healthy. For women who are sick of being given the generic advice to find balance, a new approach has arrived. Which of the five types of perfectionist are you? Classic, intense, Parisian, messy, or procrastinator? As you identify your unique perfectionist profile, you'll learn how to manage each form of perfectionism to work for you, not against you. Beyond managing it, you'll learn how to embrace and even enjoy your perfectionism. Yes, enjoy! Full of stories and brimming with humor, empathy, and depth, this book is a love letter to the ambitious, high achieving, full-of-life clients who filled the author's private practice, and who changed her life. It's a clarion call for all women to dare to want more without feeling greedy or ungrateful. Ultimately, this book will show you how to make the single greatest trade you'll ever make in your life, which is to exchange superficial control for real power. Leseprobe 1 Expect to Be Graded on This The Five Types of Perfectionists When an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside as fate. C. G. Jung A procrastinator perfectionist would experience immense difficulty writing this sentence because it comes at the beginning of a book about perfectionism and, accordingly, needs to be perfect (and there's no better first sentence than the one a procrastinator perfectionist imagines in her head but never actually writes down). A classic perfectionist writes the first sentence, hates it, tries her best to forget it ever existed, but is inevitably haunted by it for a minimum of eight years. An intense perfectionist writes it, hates it, and then channels her frustration into aggression about something entirely unrelated. A Parisian perfectionist pretends not to notice she wrote a first sentence, affecting an air of, "Oh yeah, I guess I did. Huh." Then she secretly, desperately hopes everyone loves it and, as a result, loves her. Who wrote that first sentence? I must be friends with her immediately! A messy perfectionist writes the first sentence, loves it, and then writes seventeen other, very different versions of the first sentence and loves each one of those and couldn't possibly pick just one because you can't have a favorite child, and those are all her sentence babies. One thing they all have in common: they might not even know they're perfectionists, nor appreciate all the ways perfectionism can hold them back or allow them to soar, depending on how it's managed. In the most basic sense, managing your perfectionism looks like becoming aware of the core impulse all perfectionists reflexively experience: noticing room for improvement-Hmm, this could be better-and then consciously responding to that reflex instead of unconsciously reacting to it. Perfectionists are people who consistently notice the difference between an ideal and a reality, and who strive to maintain a high degree of personal accountability. This results in the perfectionist experiencing, more of...

Autorentext
Katherine Schafler is a psychotherapist, writer and speaker, and former on-site therapist at Google. She earned degrees and trained at UC Berkeley and Columbia University, with post-graduate certification from the Association for Spirituality and Psychotherapy in NYC. She’s a contributing writer at TIME and Business Insider, Shine’s popular wellness app, and an editor-at-large for Arianna Huffington's Thrive Global.

Klappentext

If you’ve ever:

1. Been told that you’re “too intense"
2. Felt dissatisfied with your accomplishments, no matter the significance
3. Been asked to relax or take it easy
4. Felt like your personality is the problem

....this book is for you.

Psychotherapist and former on-site therapist at Google Katherine Schafler wants to get one thing straight: your perfectionism isn’t a problem, it’s a gift. It’s what makes you so brilliant and successful in the first place. And like any power, it just needs to be harnessed.

In The Perfectionist’s Guide to Losing Control, Schafler outlines the five types of perfectionists – the classic perfectionist, the angry perfectionist, the Parisian perfectionist, the procrastinator perfectionist, and the messy perfectionist – and shows you how to manage each form of perfectionism by combatting self-punishment and embracing self-compassion. You’ll learn:
Why society makes women feel guilty about their perfectionism, unless it conforms to gender rolesWhat we should appreciate about each type of perfectionist, as well as how to heal yourself from toxic self-talkHow to achieve adaptive perfectionism, rather than maladaptive perfectionism, and why the discourse around perfectionism is so negative
Managing your perfectionism doesn’t mean eradicating it, but rather, becoming aware of the core impulses you experience, and then consciously responding to those impulses. With Schafler’s advice, you’ll be able to finally tap into your power without letting it rule your life.

Remember, your perfectionism will never go away – and that’s a good thing.

Leseprobe
1

Expect to Be Graded on This

The Five Types of Perfectionists

When an inner situation is not made
conscious, it happens outside as fate.

C. G. Jung

A procrastinator perfectionist would experience immense difficulty writing this sentence because it comes at the beginning of a book about perfectionism and, accordingly, needs to be perfect (and there's no better first sentence than the one a procrastinator perfectionist imagines in her head but never actually writes down).

A classic perfectionist writes the first sentence, hates it, tries her best to forget it ever existed, but is inevitably haunted by it for a minimum of eight years.

An intense perfectionist writes it, hates it, and then channels her frustration into aggression about something entirely unrelated.

A Parisian perfectionist pretends not to notice she wrote a first sentence, affecting an air of, "Oh yeah, I guess I did. Huh." Then she secretly, desperately hopes everyone loves it and, as a result, loves her. Who wrote that first sentence? I must be friends with her immediately!

A messy perfectionist writes the first sentence, loves it, and then writes seventeen other, very different versions of the first sentence and loves each one of those and couldn't possibly pick just one because you can't have a favorite child, and those are all her sentence babies.

One thing they all have in common: they might not even know they're perfectionists, nor appreciate all the ways perfectionism can hold them back or allow them to soar, depending on how it's managed.

In the most basic sense, managing your perfectionism looks like becoming aware of the core impulse all perfectionists reflexively experience: noticing room for improvement-Hmm, this could be better-and then consciously responding to that reflex instead of unconsciously reacting to it. Perfectionists are people who cons…