Trying To Be Perfect Will
Drive You Perfectly Crazy (And Totally Annoy Everyone You Know)
In the 1999 Academy Award winning film “American Beauty,” actress
Annette Bening portrays a middle-aged real estate agent named Carolyn
who has become obsessed with the appearance of perfection; as her burned-out
advertising sales executive husband Lester (played by Kevin Spacey) states
in the film’s narrative, “See how the handle of her pruning
shears matches the color of her gardening clogs? That’s no accident.
I get exhausted watching her. She wasn’t always like this—she
used to be happy.” As Lester drops his briefcase on the way to
the car, scattering all of its contents on the sidewalk, he then states
that his wife considers him (by comparison) a “loser.”
Somewhere along the journey of her life, Carolyn chose to immerse herself
in what she perceived as personal perfectionism. The movie viewer is
given the distinct impression she’d lost her sense of self in her
attempt to be a perfect wife, homemaker and mother, during which she
collected a fair degree of self-hatred that she tries to obliterate by
chanting “positive thinking” mantras while redefining herself
with a new career. The scene where Carolyn prepares for the open house
showing of one of her properties finds her stripped to her undergarments
and high heels, reciting “I will sell this house today, I will
sell this house today.” With obsessive-compulsive frenzy she cleans
areas of the home that any potential buyer probably wouldn’t even
notice, and her incantations, scrubbing and over-enthusiastic glowing
about the home’s “fine points” are vain attempts to
bypass acknowledging reality: the house itself is just plain mediocre.
After the showing ends and a sale isn’t made, Carolyn closes the
blinds and erupts in sobs…but only for a few moments. Her aversion
to what she considers personal weakness drives her to slap herself in
the face, screaming “Shut up! Stop it you weak—you baby—shut
up!” Sobbing a couple times more, she then adjusts herself and
calmly leaves the house.
As the story continues, more about Carolyn’s obsession with perfection
is revealed. In a scene after she and Lester attend a high school basketball
game at which her daughter is a cheerleader, she “praises” her
daughter’s performance by saying, “ Honey I’m so proud
of you. I watched you closely—you didn’t screw up once!”
Carolyn is clearly in deep inner trouble. She has come to set impossibly
high standards of what she deems as perfection for herself and her family.
It’s no wonder why her husband and daughter have become repulsed
and frustrated by her lack of authenticity, her listening to “me-me-me”-centered
success tapes and “elevator music” at dinner time, and her
social climbing in the local real estate world, prompting Lester to define
her existence as merely “a bloodless, money-grubbing freak.” Ultimately,
Carolyn’s need to maintain tight control and demands of perfection
in everything around her collapses as her world slowly begins to shatter,
emphasized so perfectly when Lester tosses a platter of asparagus against
the wall.
Her affair with local real estate “king” Buddy Kane only
brings temporary respite from her inner pain, and her “four thousand
dollar sofa upholstered in Italian silk” is indeed “just
a couch,” and yes, just as Lester yells in frustration, her “stuff” (including
her perfect American Beauty roses) had become more important to her than
living. And as Lester rightly concludes, “That’s just nuts.” We
are left at the end of the movie not knowing how, or if, she will recover
after she finally understands what’s real and important, albeit
too late.
I recount this story because there is an epidemic of having to appear
perfect in our culture that is causing considerable, often irreparable
damage to our self images, personal health and both personal and working
relationships. What is sad is that whoever and whatever has dictated
what the notion of “perfect” is often is way out of line
with what most people can possibly hope to attain. Even—and perhaps
especially—those seeking spiritual enlightenment are prone to constant
self-flagellation as they set their sites on lofty goals either by personal
choice or under the influence or misinterpretation of what teachers,
books and peers have told them about how they should be.In my own experience,
I’ve had people expect me to be “perfect” since my
life’s path is partly about observing and discussing the impact
our behavior has upon our spiritual growth—even though I am the
first to say I don’t have it all down and am a student of what
I teach.
Trying to be perfect can drive you perfectly crazy. It can make you emotionally,
mentally, physically and spiritually sick, and have a profoundly negative
impact on those around you, especially if your standards of perfection
are so way out in left field they are highly questionable and at times
even laughable. If we bought into what the mainstream culture is telling
us—that we have to be impossibly thin and gorgeous, have no wrinkles,
be “super parents,” devote ourselves to work to the exclusion
of fun, non-doing and time with friends, lovers and family, be experts
up on everything, live in a constant state of sleep deprivation, etc.—it’s
no wonder so many reach for alcohol, drugs, anti-depressants, digestive
and sleep aids and sexual performance “enhancements.”
We are collectively becoming perfectly self-obsessed, neurotic, and overloaded
yet empty at the same time. An obsession with perfection will never assist
us in actualizing what we think it is. However, deeply honest self-inquiry,
discrimination as to what is real and what is illusion aided by regular
Source-connecting meditation will guide us to determine what our true
imperfections are and help us begin to re-focus our energy on the elimination
of our shadow thoughts and behaviors—of which an obsession with
perfection and an abhorrence for imperfection is included.
How else do we accomplish this? Surely not by beating ourselves up, and
absolutely not without humility, empathy, compassion and patience toward
all sentient beings, including ourselves. A strong sense of self-effacing
humor is also highly recommended, as are finely tuned BS and personal
landmines detectors.
In “American Beauty,” Carolyn buys into one of those seemingly
inarguable-at-face-value sentiments chanted by human potential devotees
and reiterated by her idol Buddy Kane: “In order to be successful,
one must project an image of success at all times.” But “faking
it until you make it” is an extremely ridiculous notion, as it
loads so much stress on the system, especially when the marker for what
can arbitrarily be called success in our culture moves all the time and
a person can forever find themselves neurotically chasing after “bigger
and better.” But even worse, projecting something you aren’t
because you want to reap the benefits you think it promises leaves you
wide open to make all sorts of spiritually self-destructive choices,
including compromising your own integrity and sense of self. This is
true whether it is moving about in the career realm, engaging in competitive
recreational activities or within both organized and loosely defined
spiritual communities.
I have seen my share of articulate, charismatic spiritual and personal
growth teachers and seminar leaders that project some dazzling image
of perfect enlightenment but behind the scenes are anything but. The
same goes for fellow seekers who consider themselves fairly advanced
but aren’t, as well as self-proclaimed healers and psychics who
have the power to influence others yet whose knowledge is fragmented.
Pretending to be what you are not is dangerous in terms of personal karma,
not to mention the harm that can be to done to those who aren’t
astute enough see things as they are beyond any smoke and mirrors. It
is a high responsibility to place yourself in any power-based relationship
with other human beings, and proclaiming a level of mastery is never
to be taken lightly.
The pursuit of excellence in any given area is a very noble quest, considering
the intention behind it is purely motivated. But one must ask within, “Why
do I want to be what I consider to be perfect? What will it cost me?
Am I setting myself up for failure? Are my goals attainable? Do I really
want what I think I want?”
True perfection has nothing to do with appearance, and authentic success
is not merely about acquiring either power or “stuff”—especially
if we neglect and abuse our overall well-being and our relationships
with others in the process. Humbly accepting the place we are starting
from and what our limitations and obstacles are, knowing where we’d
like to be and choosing intelligently to take on that path toward our
goal is a process that requires as much self honesty as it does diligent
commitment and focus. Pacing ourselves along the way so that we don’t
become overwhelmed, being wise enough to question both the value and
attainability of our quest, and refusing the pressure of both outside
forces and our own potential for myopia and egoic self-delusion that
our small self alone is the achiever are all allies in actualizing our
highest potential in any given area. No matter what you wish to master,
it’s a journey of continuous refinement in both broad and subtle
ways, and the small bites of success along the path are as equally important
as enjoying the whole pie. Accepting that we will stumble and sometimes
fall, are human and therefore are not immune to making mistakes or improper
calls in judgment, and can’t ever to expect or demand anything
to come instantly and without effort will help ensure that when we finally
reach the apex and attain our goal that we have fully earned the title
of a perfect master.
And then comes the next step where we step off the mountaintop and trustingly
let it all go…
Suzanne Matthiessen resides in Southwestern Colorado and writes, teaches
and consults about spiritual growth issues. She is in the process of
developing a collective-oriented, multi-media publishing company that
is based on the principles of Spiritual Etiquette. For more information,
please visit spiritualetiquette.com.
