This article was originally published on IDEAS.TED.COM and is excerpted below. See the full article here

So what’s driving your perfectionism? Is it about proving your worth to others? Is it about avoiding feelings of shame or judgment? While you may think you’re trying to impress a boss who seems judgmental, oftentimes we’re proving ourselves to our parents — who may or may not still be present in our lives — or to an internalized critic we’ve learned to hear above all others.

Like a lot of anxiety, perfectionism can become a comfortable habit. If we’ve been leaning into it since childhood, maintaining the self-talk that powers our perfectionism feels like a superstition or an indispensable ritual. As entrepreneur and startup cofounder Sehreen Noor Ali says, “Our self-talk becomes like an old friend that maybe should’ve been ditched a while ago.”

Your perfectionism, your old friend, won’t go away overnight. Nor will exercises alone assuage it. So my goal here is to help get you on the road to recovery by suggesting new ways of thinking.

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