Mastery mindset

One of the most common and most pernicious difficulties I work with is perfectionism. This is quite a vanilla term for a really rigid, and often brutal, internal world that carves life up into right and wrong, success or failure and one which constantly berates, undermines and denigrates. Tied to this is a constant worry about falling off the narrow tightrope created by beliefs of right and wrong, and a vulnerability to depression that comes from reducing our experiences and personhood to a dichotomous and empty score.

It’s very difficult to enjoy anything if one feels one is being constantly evaluated by unforgiving and punitive judges. These beliefs project onto the world and onto others the same inhospitable conditions of perfectionism. So what do I mean by perfectionistic beliefs? Here are some key ones:

• A fixed belief in a predetermined right and wrong/good and bad
• All or nothing beliefs that don’t accommodate degree, complexity or a bigger picture
• Beliefs that turn limitations into personal failure e.g. “I don’t know” becomes “I am stupid”
• Catastrophic predictions associated with limitations e.g. “if I don’t know, they will fire me”
• Shame based beliefs and emotions linked to limitations “not knowing is shameful (and I must hide it at all costs)”
• Overinflation of personal responsibility for things e.g. “it is all my fault and I must fix it” when perhaps there is more than one person in the situation, or there are systemic issues
• Low tolerance for difficult feelings and situations – a sense of “I must fix it” instead of “I can be with this and sometimes things go wrong”

These beliefs function to curb pleasure, learning, play, experimentation and treat ourselves and others like objects, not human beings. They cultivate both unsustainable overcompensation which can lead to burnout or avoidance (because rather not try than fail) which at best leaves us with narrow and restricted lives or at worst can get us into hot water if what we’re avoiding has heavy consequences (like a health check, work deadline etc). In addition, the inhibit effective problem solving. For example, spiralling into shame-based beliefs or angry beliefs at another’s imperfect nature prevent us from thinking about what we might actually do to improve things in objective reality.

One of the concepts that is extremely helpful in treating perfectionism, and one which I have borrowed from sports and performance psychology, is the idea of cultivating a mastery mindset. Athletes often struggle with perfectionism: after all, winning and losing are pretty binary in sport. This impacts their anxiety on high pressure days like competition days which in turn inhibits performance. Helping athletes to switch their goals to ones of mastery of their sport or discipline moves the pressure away from winning or losing on the day to a lifelong pursuit of deepening knowledge, skill and experience. Mastery can encompass mistakes, failures and limitations and transform them into information that fuels learning or growth. It shifts the perfectionistic torment away from “I am a failure” to curiosity about why something didn’t work and what might work better.

The application of this is far from limited to sport and can work anywhere. It does, however, require us to take responsibility for what we do and how we do it. We need to think about what interests us, how we might learn more, who or what can help, and how we can practise. We can reframe not being good at something as part of practising and learning in the pursuit of mastery.

Mastery allows for learning and development and crucially cannot be measured in dichotomous terms on a single occasion. It therefore allows for our humanity instead of shaming it. It is also self-determined and not up to others, and therefore sidesteps the perfectionistic trap of worrying what others think and allowing others’ minds to determine our worth. Most importantly, I think, it can be fun: a concept completely incompatible with perfectionism. It can shift and morph and develop over time, also inconsistent with the rigidity of perfectionism. And it involves others in a human way and not as projections of judgement and punishment. Others can help us to learn. They may have interesting ideas which we could consider if we fancy.

Starting points for developing a mastery mindset:

• Ask yourself what interests you?
• What would you like to learn more about?
• What might mastery look like in the domain you’re considering? (This will shift in time)
• Are there currently gaps you’d like to learn more about and what might be some of the first steps in doing this? (Consider also what is feasible for now)
• What could learning/practice look like?
• When things don’t go to plan can you try to disengage from self criticism and shift focus to actually identifying what didn’t work out and why?
• Can you identify limitations without taking them personally?
• Who or what could help?

Perfectionism takes a long time to shift and it is important not to co-opt recovery from it into a perfectionistic pursuit in itself. Perfectionism can be a wily beast like that – always recruiting experience in its service and demanding unachievable and unsustainable performance. You may want to consider what a gentle turning away from perfectionism might look like, or if you can allow it to be there but in the backseat, not holding the steering wheel. Curiosity, learning, play, experimentation and self kindness are all attributes of a mastery mindset and can be called on anytime to shift attention away from perfectionistic demands into healthier states.