That Perfect Flaw

“You are the quiet spectator in the crowd. You like order, being exact, clarity and purity of thought. Noticing the slightest detail is so natural to you that you can bring order out of chaos. You always strive to do the right thing.”

Born under the Virgo zodiac sign, I’ve been collecting Virgo bookmarks since time immemorial. Written above were the most obvious characteristics of people under the same zodiac sign as described in the latest bookmark I’ve purchased in a famous local bookstore. As long as I can remember, the mirage of inscriptions spells consistency which enabled me to dwell on the notion that Virgo-nians are fated to be called “perfectionists."

Perfectionism in psychology is a belief that perfection should be strived for. Technically the demand for perfection has been constantly causing quite a stir among individuals who possess this kind of complex. Psychologist Gordon Flett of York University in Toronto cited that perfectionists are very rarely obsessive about only one aspect of their lives; they "hate mistakes in everything”. In fact, Flett baptized this particular type of all-or-nothing thinking as the "just right" phenomenon. For a perfectionist, if something isn’t “just right”, might as well call it “useless” and be consequently tossed out to a pool of oblivion.

On the other hand, being a media student just made me more conscious on how ‘perfection’ is depicted in movies. I can closely associate two films that fall in this category: The Devil Wears Prada and The Black Swan which are actually my personal favorites.  

The female lead Miranda Priestly as portrayed by Meryll Streep in The Devil Wears Prada is an epitome of what we call ‘the horrible, perfectionist boss’. She is very hard to please with those overwhelming standards she has set for everybody else to lift their heads up. Most of all, being the editor-in-chief of New York’s fashion bible, Runway magazine converted her into a person who refuses to accept failure.

Actually, this type of perfectionism in Miranda provided her an array of benefits. It made her become a highly-motivated person regardless of the stealthy hatred her staff is having towards her. Nevertheless, she’s still very highly respected. Most of all, her strive towards perfection was rewarded by making Runway, the best-selling magazine in New York.

Contrariwise, perfectionism can be a bitch too and it’s proven true by the movie Black Swan. Natalie Portman portrayed the character of Nina, a struggling ballerina in the New York City Ballet. In order to cope up with her mother’s narcissistic views, she has transformed herself to become the best among others for her to land the lead role in the ballet performance. Blogger Douglas Eby quoted that performing arts such as ballet involve high levels of that kind of devotion to precision and excellence.

The movie strongly gave us a picture on how perfectionism can be very detrimental. Nina tortured herself to be perfect, criticizing every lapse she commits. She desperately wants to play both the White Swan and the Black Swan that’s why she constantly convinces herself that she’s not good enough. Eventually, Nina’s endless venture to perfection caused her death. Evidently,  perfection comes with a high dose of pressure and burden.

On a personal note, the two movies presented the two sides of the coin, thoughts that I should abide to since I am a self-proclaimed perfectionist. Both movies enabled me to weigh the consequences brought by ‘perfectionism’. The matter can result to downsides such as low self-esteem, self-guilt, compulsive behavior, pessimism as well as depression. However, its upshots include being motivated, competitive, a nearness to reaching your dreams, accomplishing things in the most ideal way possible and many more.

Raised in a society filled with imperfections and being born with taunting shortcomings, I consider ‘perfectionism’ as my most precious attribute. Like a true-blue Virgo, I am a very detailed person who carries an impeccable hypercritical disposition in life. Equally, I value excellence and accuracy as my life’s driving forces.

Perfectionism motivates me to excel and to improve my work. With these spontaneous ejaculations of ideas right now, I’m simply afraid that I might’ve written sentences jam-packed with grammatical errors. Honestly, I don’t want to proceed to the next sentence ‘til I become satisfied with the previous ones. It has to be reworked and reworked ‘til it sounds just right, it’s as if precision has become my ticket towards a certain kind of fulfillment. I always have this ‘inner critic’ in me.

Though we are taught to not judge a book by its cover, this line doesn’t really serve as true for everybody particularly for individuals like me. Perfectionists raise higher standards than the rest, trying to demand more from themselves and from others. Perhaps this is caused by the structure in our society that teaches us to do more, be more and have more. We have to try hard to enough to get things precisely right.

While perfectionism can be either good or bad, one thing will always constant----perfection is just an impossible dream.  In a practical manner, a perfectionist should wake up from that dream and set his/her feet back into reality.

P.S: This is my last course log in Psych10. I just thought of posting it since I believe it's worth reading. To my co-perfectionists, cheers! :))