265: Anxiety and Perfectionism: Fan Favorite Replay

Hi there. You’re listening to the Leading Lady podcast. I’m your host, AliceAnne Loftus, and I’m a certified professional coach specializing in leadership and work-life balance. I work with clients to shift their limiting beliefs, insecurities, and self-doubt. This podcast will be filled with tools and strategies to help high-achieving women like you feel connected, empowered, and in the lead of your life, both personally and professionally. Let’s transform your life. Starting now, lead yourself. The rest will follow.

AliceAnne:  Hi there leading ladies, and welcome to today’s episode. I’m going to be talking to you about anxiety and the need to strive for perfection, because let’s be honest, most of us as high-achieving women are constantly feeling the strain and anxiety of: Are we doing enough? Are we showing up? Are we delivering on the things that we said we wanted to deliver? And are people truly happy with us? It’s so easy to fall into those spiraling thoughts and to get stuck in that anxiety and that need for perfection. I want to just outwardly address it and talk about it and assure you that if you are having those thoughts, there are things that you can do to recenter yourself and diminish those feelings.

The Anxiety of Perfectionism

Recently, as I was getting ready one morning, I was just having this extreme anxiety of everybody being mad at me—like, why is everybody mad at me? And the truth is, there probably wasn’t anybody mad at me, but anxiety starts to creep in, and especially as high-achieving women or anyone that struggles with imposter syndrome, you start to worry that you’re not doing enough or that people are disappointed in you and you begin to question your value based on what other people think of you.

It truly is a manifestation of perfectionism, and so I have found that in order to release those feelings, I have to do a series of things to help recenter myself.

1. Establish a Grounding Foundation

Know your core values. I talk about this all the time, but when we’re deeply rooted in our core values, it’s easier for us to realign our decisions and our actions based on our values rather than the value that others put on us. And that’s a really hard practice to do. So I don’t want to minimize that. Oh, you’re feeling anxious? Oh, just go back to your core values. No, I don’t want to be flippant about that. But the more work you do—or we do, because I’m right there with you—the more work we do on knowing ourselves and knowing our core values, the easier it is to recenter ourselves.

That could start by developing a mindfulness practice, a gratitude journal, just doing some daily work on reminding yourself how you’re moving forward and whether or not it’s in alignment with your core values. This will not only help you in developing a strong intuition about yourself, but that can also bring you back and connect you to your mind and your body.

So things that you can do to really root yourself in that are journaling, meditation, some breathing exercises, just having a daily mantra or a daily practice of starting your day with purpose and intention in your values. I like to take a little bit of time each morning and I ask myself three questions:

• What is something that I can do today that’s proactive towards my goals?
• How can I make myself proud today—proud of myself, not proud of my kids or proud of my business, but truly proud of myself?
• What can I do today, or what can I purge today, that no longer serves me?

2. Pause and Take Inventory

My word for 2021 was “pause.” If we take a couple minutes, a few times a day, when you’re feeling that anxiety, to really pause and just take inventory of where that anxiety is showing up in your body, where those thoughts are coming from—maybe just counting your breaths—but just pausing and bringing yourself back to the moment, back to the present, so that those feelings of anxiety don’t spiral and pull you into the worry of the future or the regret of the past.

The pause of the present is so powerful in just bringing you right back to the moment and maybe just reassuring you that you’re not in harm’s way in that moment.

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3. Challenge the Thoughts

Our minds are tricky little buggers. Don’t believe everything you think. So when you feel yourself spiraling in that anxiety, in that need for perfection, really challenge the thoughts and say: Is this true? Or am I ruminating on something? Am I telling myself a narrative that’s just self-sabotaging? Is it destructive? Does it have a strong negative bias? Just call it out and say: Why am I thinking this? Is this true? Is this a helpful way of thinking? Did I really do something wrong? Was I disrespectful? Could something else be happening in that person’s life for me to be interpreting their behavior or their attitude towards me?

This reality check can be hard, especially if you’ve already gotten yourself all worked up. If you remember to kind of sit in that pause and then challenge the narrative, challenge it and say: Is this really true? It can be really impactful. Like I said, don’t believe everything you think. Sometimes that negative bias is strong and we just start spiraling through that anxiety and that need for perfection, and we lose track of reality and what the truth is and what is really happening around us.

4. Get Empowered

Look for ways in your life or in your day where you can be inspired. Go for a walk with a friend. Read an inspirational story. Surround yourself with people that you admire, and just open yourself up to that. Open yourself up to a growth mindset—to learn and experience the success of others—because it truly is empowering.

When you feel empowered, you value yourself more, and you are just enabling yourself to show up in life as your truest, most authentic self.

So how do you get empowered? I know I just said surround yourself with other people, go for a walk with someone you admire, learn a new skill—that can all sound super overwhelming when you’re spiraling, but maybe that’s the time to take inventory of the successes that you’ve had or how far you’ve come. Like I said, listening to an inspiring story or surrounding yourself with people that you admire and respect and learning from them.

Recap

So just to recap, when you’re feeling that anxiety and that need for perfection creeping in:

• Go back to your core values.
• Pause. Bring yourself back to the present moment.
• Challenge the narrative. Ask yourself, is this really true? Or could there be another explanation?
• Get empowered. Find ways to lift yourself up. Surround yourself with people you admire and who inspire you.

Just remember that when that anxiety is creeping in and when you’re starting to question: Is everybody mad at me? Am I doing enough? Am I really good at what I do? When those imposter syndrome feelings and thoughts start to creep in, what’s really happening is that nasty little perfection bug is trying to wiggle its way into your thoughts, and that just never serves anyone. Perfection is anxiety masked as excellence, and it’s just simply not true.

If you found this to be helpful, please shoot me an email. I do read and respond to every single email.

I know that as high-achieving women, we carry a lot of weight and responsibility on our shoulders, and we do often question: Are we doing enough? Am I doing the right thing? Did I offend somebody? Chances are, if you offended somebody, you’re probably human. Oh, spoiler alert, you’re probably human.

Guess what? Not everybody’s going to like you, and that’s okay. As long as you feel rooted in your core values and know that you are living your truth and being a good person and doing the very best that you can with who, where you are, and what you have, people are going to have opinions either way. But the more you value yourself and check in with your core values and what you think and feel about yourself, the less likely the weight of the opinions of others is going to feel on you. And chances are, people aren’t really even thinking about you. They’re thinking about their own stuff, and they’re managing their own imposter syndrome and their own stress and worries.

So here’s your reminder to just take a minute, get rooted in your values. Pause and bring yourself back to the present. Challenge the narrative. Ask yourself if it’s true, and then empower yourself to take meaningful and purposeful action that aligns with who you truly are at your best.

So I know this is a short episode, but if you’re struggling with that anxiety and that need for perfection, I hope that this resonated with you, and I hope to hear from you. Until next time, take the lead.

Thanks for tuning in for another episode of the Leading Lady Podcast. You can find all of the links and information mentioned in this episode at www.leadingladycoaching.com. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to follow the show so you don’t miss any future episodes. And while you’re there, it would mean the world to me if you would take a few seconds and leave me an honest review. This will allow me to be able to help other high-achieving women find inspiration, connection, and develop strategies to live and lead with purpose and intention. See you here next week.