Healing is a process of beginning to feel safe in allowing yourself to be more human. Experiences of trauma often produce the desire to be perfect through control over your environment, emotions, thoughts, and actions.
Perfectionism can give you a false sense of safety when you do not feel safe without being in control due to living in chaotic environments with complex family dynamics.
The Trap of Perfectionism
Perfectionism can convince you that you are the exception to the rule. Perhaps you feel as if you are not allowed to struggle or have hard days while everyone else around you is allowed to. Maybe you feel as if struggling or allowing yourself to be messy and human means you are not good enough.
When you are going through a healing process, it is important to let go of the need to be perfect as a way to control what you and others believe to be true about you. This helps create safety in allowing yourself to be who you are.
Allowing Yourself to Be Messy
Feeling overwhelmed by uncertainty, trying to control things, and forcing yourself to be someone you are not are symptoms that often come with not allowing yourself to be human. Feeling “messy” may provoke anxiety, which can feel scary, especially if you have spent a lifetime avoiding emotions.
Allowing yourself to be messy is part of common humanity. Relatively speaking, allowing yourself to feel the complexity and messiness of life adds to your innate wholeness—it does not take away from it.
Accepting Your Humanness
What if you were to foster acceptance rather than control? This does not mean you do not desire to change, instead, it is the very thing that allows for change to happen. When you foster acceptance of yourself for who you are and where you are—even if this means you do not like all parts of you or your life—you can shift your perspective and trajectory.
Meeting yourself where you are and beginning to shift your relationship with yourself from one rooted in perfectionism to one rooted in acceptance lets you let go of control, allow yourself to be messy, and accept your humanness. The experience of being human is definitely messy, but that does not make you bad.
Allowing yourself to simply be in your healing process and feel the messiness of being human can be uncomfortable, especially if perfectionism is strong in your life. At Avalon Malibu, we recognize how hard it can be to let go of control, make peace with uncertainty, feel your emotions, and accept yourself so that you can heal. Our professionals are here to support you as you learn what this means for you. If you are ready to begin your journey, call Avalon Malibu today at (844) 857-5992 to learn about our recovery programs.
