111: Are You Putting Pressure On Yourself To Be Perfect?

My preschooler is obsessed with Encanto right now. And because I spend a lot of time listening to the soundtrack, I started paying attention to the lyrics and it got me thinking about the pressures that we put on ourselves to be perfect to do it all.

Today I'll explain why this happens in the first place and how to start retraining your brain to get out of the “shoulds” so you can take back control of your time and energy.

What a Disney Movie Taught Me About Perfectionism

Do you know all the words to Encanto yet? Pretty sure I do. Allison is obsessed and we've been playing the songs on repeat.

It's definitely given me a new appreciation for my parents. I'm pretty sure it was Beauty in the Beast back in the day that I used to watch over and over and over again on VHS.

Why am I talking about a Disney cartoon you might be wondering…

… because movie writers are amazing at bringing real world struggles we all experience onto the big screen. Watching Encanto got me thinking about the pressures that we put on ourselves and how this leads to overloaded to-do lists and procrastination. Let me explain…

If you haven't seen the movie yet, that's okay. Here's the quick synopsis.

The story is about a family that is given magical gifts (powers). And these gifts are intended to help their family and to help their community thrive.

Everyone in the family is given a gift except for one character - Mirabelle - but the magic is fading when the movie starts and Mirabelle is trying to get the family to notice.

Spoiler alert - one of the morals of the story is the family learns that putting tons of pressure on each other to be “perfect” is hurting the family. They’re all burning out from the crazy high expectations they set for themselves, and their starting to lose their powers.

Which Encanto Character Are You?

There are 3 sisters in the movie that I want you to think about for a second:

Louisa - her gift is super strength. There’s this song where she’s carrying like 10 donkeys and she sings about the pressure she puts on herself to be the “strong one” for her family. To carry her family’s burdens. And she worries if she takes a rest or a break she’s going to let someone down.
Isabella - Her gift is to make flowers grow. She dances through the first part of the movie gracefully with flowers blooming behind her and her other sister, Mirabelle, is frustrated that she’s not perfect like Isabella. But we quickly learn Isabella is struggling. She believes she has to be perfect all the time. That if she makes a flower that’s not beautiful or perfect she’s doing something wrong. And she wishes she could just be herself for ones.
Mirabelle - She’s the one family member without a gift/power. What she struggles with the whole story is feeling like she's never enough because she wasn't given a gift. She feels like she always has to work harder and do more to impress her family.

Let me ask you this - can you relate?

I know listening to this story I can relate to a lot of these characters and the pressures that they put on themselves.

That pressure to be perfect.

The pressure to do it all (and juggle a million things at once).

And the pressure to feel like you’re living up to expectations you’ve set for yourself, or you feel like others have placed on you…

We can all relate to these struggles. I think it's part of the reason that the movie is so successful (other than the amazing lyrics and songs of course which are fantastic too).

Why Do We Put So Much Pressure On Ourselves?

The beliefs the characters struggle with in the movie are just like the beliefs that we learn in our own lives.

They’re things that we have learned over time through experiences with our family, experiences in school, with friends, or experiences in work as we get older.

The characters in the movie can do amazing things, but they also burn out and this results in their whole home crumbling around them.

We all can get into that pattern of putting a ton of pressure on ourselves to never mess up, to never make a mistake, or worrying about making a mistake or making the wrong choice.

We worry that we’re not working hard enough, or doing enough and so we put all this pressure on ourselves to take on the world to do everything…

And we end up doing more and more and more.

Look at your giant to-do list if you need an example of what happens when we feel pressured to do it all…

How many things are on your to-do list today? Probably like a million right?

A lot of those things on our to-do list tend to be things we feel pressured to do. Like we should do. Whether that pressure comes from ourselves, or the world around us.

I should make sure that I am making these fantastic dinners for my family… and my house looks like it could be in a home and garden magazine… and I work so hard and I do all these amazing projects at work and for my kids' school …

And the pressure builds.

How This Pressure Impacts Our Minds and Bodies

Maybe we don't lose a magical power and our houses crumble around us. But this movie is a really great metaphor for burnout.

Our bodies become so fatigued and so tired because we're constantly overwhelmed and stressed about messing up or being perfect.

Our brains are exhausted when we're juggling a million things at once. Plus that makes us much more likely to make mistakes. Which then makes us more worried about making mistakes! And that perfectionism cycle continues.

What’s The Solution?

The solution = take a hard look at some of those patterns. The beliefs and thoughts we can get stuck in.

Like I said, a lot of those thoughts and beliefs we learned growing up, but we continue to practice them as adults. Without taking a second to judge if they’re helpful beliefs, or something that’s holding us back.

In the movie the family realizes they didn't need to put so much pressure on themselves and that it's okay to ask for help. It's okay to make mistakes sometimes. That they are all worthy without having to do something to prove that worthiness

And the more that we take a look at our own beliefs and our own expectations for ourselves the more we'll start to recognize some of these thinking patterns that might be really getting in our way.

Is Procrastination Holding You Back? Bonus Resources!

If one of your unhelpful patterns is procrastination check out my newest free workbook - Your Insider's Guide to Stop Procrastinating

In this workbook I'll walk you through 5 questions to ask yourself to get to the root of that procrastination problem. To figure out what thoughts and beliefs are really driving your procrastination, whether that’s

worrying about finding the perfect time to start,
worrying about messing up,
worrying about not being good enough…

Then you’ll learn 4 strategies you can start using today to stop procrastinating and get stuff done. Click here to get your copy. http://http://drniollebeyers.com/stopprocrastinating