Ben Wilson, LPC

What does the passion of perfectionism look like in modern dress? It comes in an enormous number of guises. Believing that if we prayed more, loved more or better, tried harder to keep our commitments, no matter how soul destroying, worked harder, we would be 'better' people is perfectionism. Being judgmental about people who do not have to work as hard as we is perfectionism. Procrastination or inability to complete projects for fear of failure is a form of perfectionism. Inability to make changes in our lives unless they are radical and sweeping often comes from a kind of all-or-nothing thinking that is perfectionistic. In one of its most painful and pervasive forms, perfectionism can keep us in a constant state of feeling guilty over imagined failures in all areas of our lives. In all its forms perfectionism is a passion that causes us to feel that our right to our very life is tied up in whether we succeed at whatever it is that is important to us. This desperation in turn prevents us from being able truly to turn our love to other people. 

~Roberta Bondi