"The fundamental question most of us ask ourselves is: What does it take to be loved? So, we develop blueprints to help us acquire it. Some come to believe they need to excel in a sport. Some equate love with some form of genius. And others believe love stems from perpetual self-sacrifice. There are those who fear love so much that they tell themselves they'll only embrace it once they've attained perfection."
"So, many turn to perfectionism as a way to cope with their fear of love. While many of our patients highlight how much they disdain their tendency to overthink, unconsciously, they often refuse to do much of anything to slow down. Overthinking and overdoing, to them, feel like survival mechanisms, keeping their lives intact. In relationships, they constantly monitor their partners for signs of disapproval and subsequent rejection, attempting to preempt them by anticipating the other's needs and responses."
Many people create blueprints tying love to achievement, genius, or self-sacrifice. Perfectionism often becomes a strategy to cope with fear of love, producing overthinking and overdoing that feel like survival mechanisms. Perfectionistic individuals vigilantly monitor partners for disapproval, anticipate needs, and project fears, frequently misreading actual messages and failing to recognize others' needs. Socially prescribed perfectionism generates the sense that significant others require flawless performance, prompting obsessiveness and denial and producing an illusion of perfection. Mature love depends on character and the revelation and tolerance of personal flaws.
Read at Psychology Today
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