The Anxious Perfectionist Book Summary: Top 3 Insights

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (I dog-eared and underlined so many pages!)

Table of Content

This book is for…

People who get anxious in social/general situations and tend to feel “never good enough”.

(I wrote about the overlap between social anxiety and perfectionism here).

The authors added:

We wrote this book for people who:
- Are mired in anxiety, stress, and worry over not being where they believe they should be 
- Find that perfectionism has taken over their lives 
- Are interested in learning why they can't just let go of things
- Believe deep down that they're not good enough, unworthy, or unlovable 
- Are done with perfectionism but don't quite know how to quit it

What makes the authors qualified to write this book?

Michael Twohig, PhD, is a psychology professor at Utah State University, and he has authored/co-authored more than 200 research papers and nine books. He’s also the past president of the Association for Contextual Science (ACBS).

His coauthor, Clarissa Ong, PhD, is the Psychology Clinic Director at the University of Toledo. She also completed her clinical internship at McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School.

The book was a product of professional and personal interest. As Acceptance Commitment Therapy (ACT) practitioners, Michael and Clarissa said:

“We have learned — and are still learning — to accept ourselves wholly, treat perfectionistic standards differently, and revel in the inescapable complexities of life.”

👉 Recommended article: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) for social anxiety

Insight #1: Perfectionism is that annoying but lovable friend

“Give [perfectionism] space to hang out when it gets annoying and enjoy it when it enriches your life.”

Perfectionism isn’t necessarily your enemy — you don’t need to get rid of it! After all, you might even value how it gets you to work hard and do better in life. (I know I do.)

Think of perfectionism as a friend who cares too much: they often go overboard and get too intrusive.

The key is learning when to listen… and when not to.

It can be helpful to understand the difference between adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism:

Adaptive perfectionism	Maladaptive perfectionism
Pursuing high standards that are still achievable Striving towards your goals without burning out Feeling fulfilled when you meet your goals Being understanding and even compassionate when you don’t meet your standards/expectations	Pursuing unrealistically high standards Striving with enormous costs e.g. burning out Feeling dissatisfied even when you meet your goals Feeling distressed when you don’t meet your standards/expectations. This often leads to excessive self-criticism

Notice the similarity and difference: both adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism feature high standards, but the latter comes at a much bigger emotional cost.

So what can you do when your perfectionism becomes unhelpful?

You can acknowledge and disengage, which frees you from its constant pestering. You can also call BS on its reasoning…

Insight #2: Free yourself from the dictatorship of rules

“The most effective weapon perfectionism has is rules… Without rules, perfectionism is powerless.”

Rules help reinforce perfectionism. Here’s a list of examples Michael and Clarissa gave:

I should (meet all my deadlines)
I should not (still be mad over that comment)
I have to (get rid of my anxiety)
I must (make the right decision)
If I (feel sad when friends don’t reply to my texts), it means I (am pathetic)
I can’t (switch jobs at this point in my career)
I’m too (needy) to (be in a relationship)

What supercharges rules, however, are reasons. Reasons make rules seem legit… even when they are not. And our brains love anything that sounds logical (this is known as the coherence bias). For example:

Because I need to prove myself to others
Because I don’t want people to think that I’m dumb
Because I’m better than this

Now, it’s unlikely that you will stop following the rules of your perfectionism, since you probably have been used to doing so for a long time.

But you can learn how to follow them less, so that you have more freedom to do what you want (vs. what you think you should/must). Here’s what Michael and Clarissa recommended…

Rather than focusing on how logical a rule might sound, focus on how helpful it is.

For example, it might make sense to never say the wrong thing in a conversation, but how helpful is it really?

PS – If you want to understand the rules of perfectionism — what makes us so obedient to them — on a deeper level, here’s a list of questions that Russ Harriss, an ACT therapist, shared.

Insight #3: Meet the big boss of perfectionism…

Before I go into that, let’s start with an exercise…

How would you describe yourself in three words?

These words are what Michael and Clarissa call self-labels: “words you use to describe yourself”.

Of course, self-labels can be much more elaborate, say in the form of self-stories (stories about how you describe yourself).

These deep-rooted stories of who you are, and why you are the way you are, are powerful as they shape how you see yourself, your life, and even the world. They are a sneaky way to make perfectionism sound even more logical and compelling!

Arguably the most common self-story of perfectionism is one of self-criticism.

“Self-criticism is the defining feature of perfectionism”

For example,
“There’s something wrong with me” (self-story)
→ “I need to make sure I make everyone like me” (rule)
→ because I need to make up for my deficiency (reason)

(Sadly, this is a common scenario for people with social anxiety.)

*What my mind likes telling me now and then…*

To be less trapped by a self-critical label/story, here’s an exercise that Michael and Clarissa shared:

1. Identify three self-critical stories or labels you believe to be true about yourself and write them down in your notebook.

2. How long have you carried these self-criticisms with you? Pick the one you've grappled with the longest. 

3. Take yourself back to the first time you remember having this thought. How old were you? (Most people say they were really young.)

Should you buy this book or not?

Hell yes!

While I’ve summarized my favorite insights, there’s a lot of good stuff — great stuff, really — that I had to cut out. Things that I’d have loved to include in the summary include…

How to set more realistic goals without beating yourself up (hint: it’s not about the outcome)
How to practice self-kindness even when you hate yourself
The 3-minute exercise to move away from unhelpful labels and stories about yourself
When and why your values can actually harm your well-being

The book is available on Amazon:

The Anxious Perfectionist: How to Manage Perfectionism-Driven Anxiety Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy

PS – To be truly aligned with our mission to create high-quality content, I decided that Deeper Conversations won’t be an Amazon book affiliate, since that might distort the incentives. If you enjoy the summary, feel free to buy us a coffee, so that we can keep creating high-quality book summaries like this!

Now, whether you buy the book or not, that’s cool! Check out the author interview and the reflection Qs at least:

Interview with Michael Twohig and Clarissa Ong

Reflection Qs

To help you turn the knowledge from my book summary into action, here’s a list of Qs for you.

(You don’t have to reflect on all of them, of course — just pick one that caught your attention, take out a pen and a piece of paper, and write down your response!)

Category	Questions
Reflect on past experiences	Recall a moment when you were in a social or general situation, and that nagging feeling of “never good enough” crept in. What was it like, and how did it affect you? How did you cope with the feeling? Sometimes, perfectionism can feel like a demanding boss. Reflect on a time when it dictated your choices and actions, and the impact it had on your well-being. How does perfectionism impact your relationships with others? Can you recall an instance where it created a connection or drove a wedge between you and a loved one? Imagine that your life is a video game, and perfectionism is one of your sidekicks. How would you describe its role and evolution throughout the game?
Imagine a new reality	Consider the rules and reasons that govern your perfectionism. Is there one you wish you could let go of, and why? (If it helps, refer back to the rules I listed above and see if there’s one that you resonate with the most.) Imagine a world where you set goals without self-criticism. What goal would you tackle differently and why? If you could chat with your perfectionism — just like you would with a friend — what would you say to it? What questions would you ask in the conversation?

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