Setting a New Goal as an Anxious Perfectionist

Anything I can do, I can do better.

If I had a motto in life, this is it. I am an anxious perfectionist. I set standards for myself that I can't achieve. Being a perfectionist does not mean, however, that I am perfect. I am an average person with an average life. I am comfortably in the middle, yet I feel that I can always be a little better at being average. Being an anxious perfectionist does not mean that I have super human powers, nor have I accomplished more than people who do not set themselves up for failure with unrealistic expectations. I have not given a Ted Talk, but I have lost sleep over analyzing specific words I used in a conversation two months prior. I have not set any athletic records, but I have spent hours wondering if a modification in my foot strike would help me improve my running split time for the next Family Fun 5K in my town. I was not valedictorian in school, but I finished all of my assignments days, if not weeks, ahead of time, graduating with excellent time management skills, and a pot of scholarship money for college.

Whenever I do something, I flirt with overdoing it. Running for exercise became training for a marathon. Running a marathon led to running on an injury, then to an indefinite break from my favorite exercise. Trying spinning classes after the running injury led to getting certified, and adding teaching to my already overloaded schedule. Joining a nonprofit board to support a local charity became serving as Chair of the Board because I can't set firm boundaries. I interpreted enjoyment of my profession as a need to move up the institutional ladder, often at the cost of my personal time and mental health. Whatever I do, I can’t help but wonder if I could do it faster, or stronger, or quicker, or more accurately. I question if I could be funnier, kinder, healthier or more industrious. Who am I doing this for? Do I have highly competitive, overachieving parents? Nope. Their biggest goal for me was to leave the house at 18 and not come back. Really, just go anywhere. Buh-bye! Do my children, or my spouse tell me to reach for the stars? Nope. Am I competing with the mommy group? Social media? I know that looking at the grass on the other side of the screen has increased my anxious perfectionism, but it was there long before mommy groups and Instagram selfies.

In a culture of busyness and burn out, anxious perfectionism is often rewarded, or even revered, yet the personality trait is very destructive. I can no longer run because I ran on a serious injury that won’t heal. I struggle being in the moment because I worry about what I did or what I am going to do that won't measure up. I stopped sleeping for months, and I still spend several nights a month watching Golden Girls and infomercials until the sun comes up. I struggled with body image after college. I'm pretty sure that my greatest strength professionally is accepting constructive criticism. Compliments make me squirm because I secretly think I don't deserve to receive them.

Creative writing has always been my reprieve from perfectionism. I took creative writing courses in college for fun and for my own fulfilment. I created a blog, just like thousands of other moms, in the mid 2000’s. I had no intention to post cute photos of my house or our smiling family wearing matching outfits, sitting casually on a picnic blanket in a field. I had no advice to give or desire to outline ways one could be more successful as a mom. I didn’t write for an audience. I wrote for me. The blog started as a space to tell stories about the silliness and shenanigans that take place with a husband and a baby. My first essay documented how my husband forgot to feed our six-month old baby one day because I hadn’t instructed him to do so. We were new parents, in love with one another, the life we created, and equally overwhelmed with how to make it all work. I’ve practiced writing for 14 years, documenting my parenting journey. My writing shifts as I experience, adapt and shift as a wife and mother.

My method for years was simple; keep the content focused on my perspective as a parent, write one draft, and try to complete the piece in an hour. I jot lines in notebooks and on the backs of envelopes and send myself voice dictations while driving to work. I then write alone, in corners of my home while the kids yell, the dog barks and pasta boils over on the stove. My initial posts centered around fun and humorous stories about being a new mom. My writing has matured with me. My perspective as a mother is more than my husband forgetting to change a diaper or wash a bottle. Life as a mother swallowed me whole and I have adored it, hated it, yearned to be anything but it, and now, I seek balance between my identities. Through writing, I am holding a conversation with myself, seeking to better understand how to hold space for all these dichotomies. The process of writing is very intimate to me. The act of sharing it publicly invites people into my personal space. I ask the reader to be swallowed with me.

My blog is no longer a blog to me. I have changed the way I speak about my writing. I use language like "essay" and "pieces". It's not a hobby and it's not a habit; it's art. And because anything I can do, I can do better, I have committed to improving my art. I still write short and fast pieces with little editing. Many essays begin from a sentence written on a napkin, blossoming into something larger. However, I now seek out feedback from other writers and I am editing more than ever before, revisiting themes and phrases, reworking language and adding context.

My goal to improve is two-fold. I want to be better because I know I can be, and I want to publish. This is both exciting and dangerous for me. I don't want my anxious perfectionism to change my relationship with my writing. I need my art to continue to be a space for healing and reflection. I want to share my work with a larger audience, but I fear the rejection I'll receive in the process will result in a shift in my relationship with my writing, or worse, cause me to stop writing. I worry that the act of submitting essays for publication sets me up for a goal I can't achieve. I'm smart, but I wasn't valedictorian. I ran, but I wasn't a competitive runner. Yes, I write, but am I really a Writer? If I never publish, does that make my writing less worthy? Today, I don't think so. Improving my craft has brought me joy, given me patience, and inspired and focused me at a time of great uncertainty. Do I want to see my byline on a site other than melissaomarietta@wixsite.com? Sure, I do, but I promise, here, publicly, that I will keep writing, even if no one else is reading.