Series: Healing For Damaged Emotions
#6 Understanding Perfectionism
Mar 15, 2009
What is it that makes you tired? What are those things that drain your spirit, sap your strength and overwhelm you with exhaustion? The answers to these questions can range from not enough sleep, overwork, too many responsibilities, over involvement, and the fast pace of our world today.
For some of us, both Christian and non-Christian, the source of our weariness is the heartbreak of perfectionism. Those of us raised in the church know that Jesus told us to be perfect. We read it in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:48) and these words of Jesus, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Be assured that it has been pointed out to us time and again that this verse is not a suggestion or a fancy idea, but rather a command: “Be perfect….” As Methodist Christians we believe in a second work of grace called sanctification, or the deeper life, or as John Wesley called it, “being made perfect in love.” Knowing ourselves as we do, we know that being perfect is impossible, and so we casually ignore that command of Jesus, or we rationalize by saying that Jesus means we will be made perfect in heaven, or we simply walk away thinking Jesus is completely crazy.
I want us to be clear that we are looking at perfectionism. We are not looking at absolute human perfection, which is an impossibility. There is no one perfect, even though you may think yourself to be so. We also are not speaking of Christian perfection also known as sanctification or being made perfect in love. Let me briefly illustrate what Christian perfection is. Picture a sunny, humid and very hot August Saturday afternoon. You are mowing your lawn. You are about ¾ finished and you are perspiring greatly. Your 5 year old has been playing in the sandbox. As you turn to make another pass with the lawn mower, you see him standing in front of you with a glass filled with ice and water. As your eyes meet, he lifts the glass toward you offering its cold refreshment. You turn off the lawn mower and reach for the glass. As you take it you notice that sandbox sand is mixed in with the ice, clippings of grass are floating on top, dirty droplets of water are running down the side of the glass. That is a picture of Christian perfection and of what Jesus meant when he said, “Be perfect even as my Father is perfect.” Was that ice water absolutely perfect? Not at all because it had grass, sand, and dirt floating in it. What made that glass of ice water perfect? It was a pure, genuine, sincere and loving heart of a little boy wanting to do something kind and loving for his father. That is what we mean by Christian perfection.
We are, however, focusing on perfectionism, which is an aberration of Christian perfection in many followers of Jesus, which also plagues non-Christians as well. We want to focus on understanding perfectionism and next week we will look at the cure for this damaged emotion. Whenever the genuine appears, the counterfeit is close by. Instead of making us holy and righteous like Jesus, perfectionism leaves us like the Pharisees and emotional neurotics in a constant state of exhaustion.
One of the great dilemmas of Christian preaching and teaching is that those who ought, should and need to hear the message don’t hear it! And those who ought not, should not, and don’t need to hear the message, are the ones who hear it and take it to heart! So, if you are thinking, “this doesn’t apply to me at all,” then listen up because it probably does!
I. Perfectionism begins with the tyranny of the “oughts.” It is the constant and nagging feeling of never doing well enough or being good enough. While this feeling permeates all of life, it seems to settle the most in our spiritual lives. This tyranny is revealed when we often think and/or say, “I ought to do better” or “I ought to have done better” or “I ought to be able to do better.” While this is true to a certain extent for all of us, perfectionism drives every aspect of our lives from cooking meals to your walk with Jesus. The 3 favorite words of the perfectionist are coulda, shoulda, woulda. The perfectionist is always standing on tiptoe, always reaching, ever trying but never able to quite make it.
II. The second symptom of perfectionism is self-depreciation. Interestingly enough there is a correlation between perfectionism and low self-esteem. If you are never quite good enough, if you are never quite satisfied with yourself and your accomplishments, then the next step is very easy and that is, God is never really pleased with me either. In fact, it seems that God is always saying, “That was nice, but come on now, you can do better than that.” And since you are a perfectionist you think, “Of course, God is right!” When it comes to your life, God and you demand the best, but the best is always elusive and unattainable. You never arrive but you must never stop trying.
III. The 3rd symptom of perfectionism is anxiety. The tyranny of the ‘oughts’ and the self-depreciation produce an oversensitive conscience filled with guilt, anxiety, and condemnation. A dark cloud constantly hangs over your head. Revivals and retreats are like a breath of fresh air because there you “make a deeper commitment and surrender to Christ” vowing to do better. Back into the real world, the overall vague sense of God’s disapproval and condemnation slowly begins to fill your heart and mind again.
IV. These 3 symptoms are often accompanied by a great legalism filled with do’s and don’ts, shoulds and should-nots, rules and regulations. Why is this? The perfectionist with his oversensitive conscience, his low self-esteem, and his almost built-in sense of automatic guilt is very sensitive to what others think about him. Here’s what happens: since he is unable to accept himself and is not sure of God’s approval, he needs the approval of other people; and becomes quite tender to the opinions of other people. Everything he reads or hears causes him to “navel gaze.” He is constantly introspecting: maybe that is what’s wrong with me, maybe if I do this I would be better, maybe if I quit this then I would have peace and joy in my life. Maybe then God would accept me and be pleased with me.
All the while the do’s and don’ts pile up because there are more people to please and oft times those people have different opinions and it becomes a nightmare trying to be and do what everyone else wants and expects. Before long the perfectionist, attempting to be perfect in everyway and for every person, becomes enslaved by what Paul calls in Galatians 5:1, “the yoke of bondage.”
The good news is that the way to God is not the path of perfect performance, so you can get off that never-ending treadmill. No matter how much we try we could never WIN God’s favor. Why? because God’s favor is not earned. It is a love-gift from Him to you out of His grace through Jesus.
V. The worst symptom of perfectionism is anger. Ever so slowly deep in the perfectionist’s heart anger begins to develop. A resentment is building up against the oughts, the have-tos, the shoulds that are squeezing him. A bitterness is growing toward himself, toward the Christian faith, against other Christians, and even against God. The sadness is that this bitterness is not against the God of the Bible, but against the perception and understanding of the god his perfectionism has created—a god who is never satisfied, or pleased no matter how hard he tries, what he gives up or what he tries. When he gets close this cruel god ups the ante and moves the finish line, and then smirks with a sickening glee, “That’s not quite good enough!” Anger against this god grows like dandelions in your front yard.
VI. The final symptom of perfectionism displays itself in denial. Because anger is considered such a terrible sin, it is denied and pushed down into the locked trunk in the corner of the basement of our lives. Emotional warmth becomes a cold distance and emotional separation as walls are built around his heart to protect him from further pain. Under the stress of living with a self he cannot like, a God he cannot please, and other people he cannot get along with, one of two things often happen: either there is a breakaway or a breakdown. The breakaway happens when the perfectionist gives up trying and walks away from Christ and Christianity. It is simply too hared and too frustrating. The breakdown happens when the load becomes to heavy to bear and he breaks down like a car along the turnpike--no longer able to pray, read the bible, worship, or serve the Lord in any way.
What is the answer to the perfectionist’s dilemma? Grace! And the grace revealed in Jesus who extends His invitation, “Come to me all who are weighed down by life’s striving for perfection. Take my yoke for my yoke is easy, my burden is light. I will give you rest.” For the perfectionist who carries a load of weight, living under the cruel taskmaster of tying to be perfect, the grace-filled words of Jesus come as cool water to a dry, and thirsty tongue. “My yoke is easy” means that Jesus will take away our yoke of slavery and give us His yoke, tailor-made specifically for each of us, and it fits perfectly. The very heavy burden of perfectionism is replaced by Jesus’ very light burden because He will never leave you nor forsake you.
The healing of our damaged emotions does not happen overnight and will take a lot of time to reprogram our hearts. But the healing for perfectionism is what’s so amazing about God’s grace!