Perfectionism and overeating
February 10, 2011Do you consider yourself a perfectionist? When you are less than perfect, what happens? Do you even know? Women seem to be especially vulnerable to the temptation to be perfect. I have always had a philosophy that we can focus on one major item at a time. Maybe that is your career, going to school, your financial portfolio, or your physique. There always seems to be one over arching goal that takes priority over the rest.
Recently I was reading Treating Eating and Weight Issues by Karen Koenig and she really nailed quite a few things, I thought I would share here. Karen mentions in her book that overeaters may be perfectionists and that “the only place they allow themselves to be imperfect is around food” (94). She also says that we actually need to be able to make a mess sometimes and to be able to allow ourselves room to fail. She says: “The more [we] try to achieve, succeed, and be faultless and flawless in other areas of life, the more out of control [our] eating becomes” (94). Something to seriously ponder. Knowledge being half the battle, the other half is of course coming up with solutions. I personally think that if it seems that a good strategy is to find other ways of allowing ourselves to be out of control besides eating more that our fair share. Where can we loosen up the grip, let loose and be free other than mindless overeating?
