Do you constantly question your skills and abilities? Are you frequently worrying about making mistakes or falling short of what others expect of you? Do you find yourself consumed by fears about how people perceive you? Maybe you even have difficulties understanding your needs and drawing healthy boundaries in your relationships and work life.
If this sounds familiar, you may be struggling with an anxiety disorder marked by perfectionism, poor boundaries, over-explaining, and low self-worth – perhaps even leading to shame.
Given the increased complexities of our current era, anxiety has become a normal fixture in North American life. So if you are one of the many adults struggling to feel safe and secure amidst all the unknown, know you are not alone.
"Anxiety was born in the very same moment as [human]kind. And since we will never be able to master it, we will have to learn to live with it—just as we have learned to live with storms."
In a society that seems to value productivity more than anything else, is it no wonder that it also highly promotes its toxic twin, perfectionism? While perfectionism may seem like a good thing, it is often rooted in anxiety disorders and can severely impact your psychological wellbeing and relationships. Perfectionism is connected to unrealistically high standards. Trying to meet those high standards can drain our energy; and when the inevitable failure comes, we meet it with self-criticism. Some who struggle with perfectionism will even avoid progress and growth to avoid failure. These perfectionist tendencies often stem from long-held feelings of self-doubt and worries about messing up or being turned away that usually have their roots in early life experiences.
When you constantly fear others’ judgments, you may find yourself over-explaining your actions and struggling to establish healthy boundaries. This can manifest as a compulsion to justify your choices, thoughts, and behaviors in an effort to ward off potential criticism or disapproval.
This need for external validation often translates into difficulty declining requests or asserting your own needs. You might find yourself agreeing to things you’d rather not do, or failing to speak up when your boundaries are crossed.
Over time, this pattern of prioritizing others’ wishes over your own can lead to:
Feelings of exhaustion and burnout
Growing resentment towards others
A diminished sense of self-worth
Increased anxiety in social situations
Difficulty identifying and expressing your own desires
This cycle can significantly impact your mental health, relationships, and overall life satisfaction.
“No" is a complete sentence.”
At the heart of anxiety issues linked to perfectionism and an excessive other-orientation is a deep-rooted lack of self-esteem. When you don’t believe in yourself, it can start a harmful cycle where you’re always doubting your skills, choices, and value as a person.
This lack of confidence can make it hard to:
Trust your own judgment
Feel proud of what you’ve achieved
See yourself in a positive light
Instead, you might find yourself looking at everything you do through harsh, critical eyes. This low self-esteem often makes you think you need others to tell you you’re good enough. As a result, you might become too reliant on getting approval from others.
This pattern can affect many areas of your life, including:
How you make decisions
Your relationships with others
Your overall mental health and happiness
Low-self esteem left to its own devices will eventually lead to its cousin, shame – a hostile emotional experience directed toward ourselves where we feel worthless, flawed, or inadequate as a person. It’s that sinking feeling we get when we’ve done something ‘wrong’ or when we’re confronted with our shortcomings that can lead to feelings of low self-worth, depression, and anxiety. We may try to hide or avoid the things that make us feel ashamed – or even avoid people we care about because we don’t want them to see it. And so, to protect ourselves from judgment or rejection, we hold back parts of who we are and lose the closeness with others that gives life meaning and joy.
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."
In my therapy practice, I specialize in helping people break free from this kind of anxiety. Many struggle with a cycle of perfectionism and approval seeking, which often leads to constant self-doubt, negative thoughts, and loss of confidence.
My approach to treating anxiety is both compassionate and based on proven methods. I aim to not only give you the tools to overcome these deeply rooted habits, but also to understand them with kindness and rebuild your self-esteem. Together we can help you regain control over your thoughts, feelings, and body sensations, allowing you to live a more fulfilling life aligned with your values and desires.
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) offers a powerful approach to challenge the deep-seated beliefs driving your anxiety by addressing the root causes that fuel perfectionism and self-criticism. Somatic therapy helps by focusing on the body-mind connection, teaching techniques to recognize and release physical tension patterns associated with anxious thoughts, thereby promoting relaxation and emotional regulation. While IFS (Internal Family Systems) therapy helps anxiety by identifying and harmonizing different “parts” of your psyche, allowing you to understand and soothe the anxious aspects of yourself from a place of compassionate self-leadership.
Through compassionate guidance, you’ll develop crucial skills to:
This transformative process empowers you to:
Maybe you’re wondering: what if it’s too much, too fast, too soon?!
That’s fair! We’ve all tried to make too many changes too quickly before and how does it usually end? Oh that’s right, with a return to the normal patterns accompanied by some unpleasant feelings of shame and ‘not enoughness’. How about we just skip that unpleasantness? Instead, we will work with your body cues as you make changes. If you’re feeling it’s too fast, we slow down. If it’s too much, we explore what just enough looks and feels like. For lasting change to occur, we need to be in tune with where we are and what we can handle. You and your body are the leaders.
Always.
What if I don’t know who I am without my anxiety?
The goal isn’t to fundamentally change who you are, but to liberate yourself from restrictive thought patterns and behaviors. Just as important to remember is that while anxiety can make life harder for you, it is not your enemy. No part of you is. There is nothing wrong with you for experiencing anxiety. It’s an invaluable tool your brain has developed to get your attention and spur you to action – it can just get hijacked.
Therefore, the goal isn’t to rid you of something that genuinely serves you! But merely to know the difference between when it’s helping you and when it’s not, and to know what to do when it’s not.
Will I be coerced into taking medication?
Again, I want to remind you that your treatment is in your hands. Exploring medication interventions is a personal experience and a personal decision. I will educate you on this option – should it seem appropriate – and may offer a referral to someone who can explore it more thoroughly with you, but it would be your decision, and you need to be comfortable with it.
Being able to share our feelings of anxiety and shame with trusted friends or a therapist can be an important step in overcoming them. When we’re able to talk about our experiences (especially shame) and have it met with empathy and understanding, it can help us start to heal and rebuild our self-esteem. This journey of self-discovery and growth opens the door to a more genuine, fulfilling life – one that may have seemed out of reach before. By confronting these challenges head-on, you can reshape your relationship with yourself and the world around you, paving the way for the life you’ve always envisioned but perhaps never thought possible.
If you would like to schedule an appointment or a free consultation to discuss any questions you have regarding trauma therapy, click the link below.
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