Being a Perfectionist Almost Ruined Happiness

I thought of myself as a perfectionist. I don't know why, but I wanted to achieve seemingly notoriously hard expectations. Back in high school, I was in a group where we worked on one of the presentations for The Odyssey. The project didn't appear to be promising as I was pretty demanding. Back then, I wanted the project to look flawless and have all the colors and things in the right place, even though there were more things to improve. Most of the presentations were blatantly horrible and inadequate for my taste. So, when I decided to do another Odyssey presentation on my own, I was pretty happy. I thought that example perfectly showed my demanding perfectionism.

"a 'perfectionist' has a personality that strives for flawlessness"

For those under a rock, a "perfectionist" has a personality that strives for flawlessness. This is often accomplished through fixating on imperfections, trying to control situations, working hard, or being critical of the self or others" (Scott). Perfectionism has several traits: fear of failure, procrastination, focus on results, and essential and unrealistic standards. I fulfill most of these traits, and I'll tell you a story.

Two weeks from the time of publication, I received a B on Pre-Calculus Honors, in which I flunked all the classwork in the very last quarter. Having a B was a good grade, especially in an honors class where grades were weighed. However, I didn't feel that great receiving a B after a series of straight A's. I didn't want to be a valedictorian and excel in school, but I still wanted straight A's for my college resume. Here's how I got there.

After finishing my third quarter with a bang, I thought I could collect new information after completing the Science Olympiad and Geometry. I was wrong. When I heard something about linear systems and matrices, it began to go downhill. I thought that the topics were too difficult to understand, and they were more complicated for me to connect to due to the newness. I didn't ask for help because I can always look online.

"I would often go to Symbolab to find answers to some problems that would be quite hard for me to solve on my own. I even use it to check some answers and try to know why. Other than that, I would go to PurpleMath and Math is Fun to learn more about concepts, in which many parts don't help me in problems"

The first part of linear systems and matrices was relatively easy, as it involved solving systems of equations. I've solved systems of equations and knew the three ways of actually solving systems. So, I know how they work, and I am confident that I can do them just fine. However, the strategies to get to three variables puzzled my 16-year-old brain when it got to the three variables. Although the concept was relatively easy, it was in no way easy during practice. If you mess up at any point, you must start all over, and most come unnoticed. This whole unit went before the last quarter, but I struggled and fell into the trap many times. One of the chapter's homework (probably one or two of those) took over an hour to finish (other things make them take more than the recommended 20-30 minutes per class). When I checked the answers, some of them required me to start the problem repeatedly to catch one silly mistake, usually messing up with the signals or doing the addition wrong. So, when I took a quiz on one of those, I got a C.

Linear systems and matrices came on shortly. They were some of the most confusing parts of Pre-Calculus, at least from my experience. Let's start on linear systems, in which I must learn partial fraction decomposition. I got through the two variable part of it, but it hit me when it got to the three variable part. Not only did the three unstable details get me, but also the repeating factors got me too. For the most part, linear systems meant dealing with fractions with variables and solving them without needing to graph them. The concepts for the repeating factors were incredibly confusing. It got my quiz average to a B. Like I said, having a B in an honors class is a good grade, but I'm a perfectionist. So, I wanted that A overall. Matrices were one of the worst topics in maths for me. They take hours to do, and I don't see much of their connection. Their goal was to get them in these two weird names like Reduced Row-Echelon form, but I have absolutely no idea how to get them into zeroes. Unfortunately, they put my average quiz grade to a B. Even before that, I failed almost all my classwork with Bs and Cs due to the overly confusing steps required to solve a couple of problems.

I must solve the matrices for most of the problems in one classwork, and very few people can finish it in time. I must ask someone who knew how to do this, and even that person was quite skeptical. At one problem, it asked me to get into that atrocious Reduced Row-Echelon form, and I forgot everything. I even asked a girl for this, and she thought of me as suspicious. Besides that, I must go through a whole load of steps that can mess up at any point without me knowing anything about it. I got a C on that one because I could not finish it on time, like everyone else, even my friends with similar academic achievements as I do.

Although it got more manageable when I dealt with adding and subtracting matrices, multiplying matrices was a whole different ball game. The worst parts with these topics were the same when I dealt with coping with three variable systems of equations. When you mess up, you start all over again.

But this time, you must go through heaps of steps needed to solve the systems of equations. Getting the matrices into the Reduced Row-Echelon form required going through numerous smaller, simpler operations that can mess up after missing one step. And these steps were atrocious. I must solve a short equation like placing over 1000 engines for 1000 cars. By themselves, they are not strenuous but doing more than 5 times made it way harder. After all that, I managed to get a B+ on the test. My grade went down to a B. Like I said, having a B in an honors class is a good grade, especially in a maths class, but I'm a perfectionist. So, I wanted that A overall.

At this point, my parents were quite concerned that I could not get into a good college or even apply for a prestigious scholarship. I was pretty depressed that I didn't get an A in one class. I tried to move on and say that it's not a big deal and definitely not the end of the world, but I couldn't. So when my mother asked me whether I could get an A in maths, I half-heartedly said yes. The thing was that I must have a pro study plan to retain an A in maths for a couple of reasons. First, I decided to apply to a university with a major in computer science in mind (I would instead take something with computer science to get the best employability possible). Computer science required a lot of maths, and a B in maths was not good for me to persevere in college. Second, I wanted to go to a prestigious university to get the best networking opportunities possible. I wanted to be a filmmaker, and even computer science was a problematic major to get into without a vast amount of networking (I thought of that as nepotism). But having a B in maths made me believe that an A in maths would be an unrealistic standard.

I was highly critical of almost everything throughout my maths class this year. I may even be required of you because you may be hiding something from me. I had the same maths teacher for the past 3 years, and I will be gimped to the same teacher for another year. I was afraid of even getting a B due to all this success with A's. I thought that being a B student would make me lose respect for my family members and even myself. I already have poor respect for my family members due to my inability to do what they say and being so busy with my own work and stuff like that. So, I basically had awful memories about it.

That term in maths was one of the many instances where I failed to achieve perfection. I don't know what to say on this one other than it being a poor move for myself. I didn't have much choice to fail maths before the end of the third term for this school year, but it was pretty rough. If you're wondering, I still retained my A's on every subject besides maths, even though psychology was about to kill me slowly.

Although it wasn't the best example of me being a perfectionist, it was undoubtedly the most recent. I have other instances where my perfectionism really shined in, like that English project, my presentations, and that kind of stuff. Since then, perfectionism was no longer the best trait for most people, and even myself. The problem for me was that, as an aspiring filmmaker, most of my film idols were perfectionists. They spent most of the time obsessing over the results of their projects, to the point of overextending the budgets a lot and pushing their cast members to the absolute limit.

"I was quite clueless why I decided to have filmmakers to compare to my perfectionism. My perfectionism was quite subtitle and you may not even notice it. It's not at the level with filmmakers who are notoriously obsessed about something to the point of nailing someone's phone on the wall."

So, it has been a massive struggle for me to completely move out of perfectionism because there was one thing that makes it great. I thought that being a perfectionist would generate something tremendous and inspiring. But unfortunately, that trait was healthy perfectionism. The short story I told you was an example of unhealthy perfectionism because I was so fed up with failure and fear of not achieving a goal not set up for me. Having something so wrong in you recently made the transition far harder than it should. I may have plans to get out of that for some time, but I am definitely not sure, and it would take years and years.

Sources Used:

Elizabeth Scott, PhD. “10 Telltale Signs You May Be a Perfectionist.” Verywell Mind, Verywell Mind, 5 Jan. 2022, www.verywellmind.com/signs-you-may-be-a-perfectionist-3145233. Accessed 19 April 2022.