My Thoughts On Perfection & Autism 😁💜💚

Hello world! Welcome back to another blog. In this blog, and in honour of Hidden Disability Awareness week, I will be talking about something we all aim to strive for in our given area of work, but for autistic people it’s more noticeable and can have negative implications if we’re not careful… perfection. As mentioned in previous blogs, I’ll be explaining this through my experience. But I hope this will help anyone reading this who struggles with perfection.

What is Perfection?

Perfection for me is the term used the highest achievement of something. Whether that’s the highest score on a video game, top marks in a test, or the cleanest house on the planet. 

Why Do Autistic People Strive For Perfection

The way I see it, alot of autistic people strive for perfection because society has led us to believe that you have to be to to date with everything, whether that’s household chores, or tasks at work or activities. For example, at my day job, one task is to make sure that all the shelves are nice and tidy, whilst working at a certain pace. Whilst I do get the procedures as to why (as the last thing customers need is a messy shop), sometimes it can be one of the hardest jobs. So if I’m more tired than usual or I’m in a low mood (most likely due to lack of sleep), it can make that task simply impossible. But it’s examples like this where autistic people mask their real mental capacity to get the task done, therefore trying to follow society’s rules of perfection. 

Pros of Perfection:

I’ll speak briefly about the two main pros on striving for perfection. These include:

• Structure and routine-whether that’s in your daily tasks if at your job, recognising a similar patterns will be able to help you work more efficient e.g. at my day job, for certain products I need to reduce, some have a longer sell by date than others. So focusing on the ones that have the shorter days than products with a longer date (within a certain time frame) will be able to help me get into a nice flow to complete the task at hand

• Hyperfixation-when we’re focused on a certain task, we can look at every single detail to make sure it’s all correct e.g. when writing, I’ll set a timer to purely focus on writing. Not only does it help me get lots done, but it’ll also help me see if every detail of the task is spot on

Cons of Perfection.

Whilst the pros are significant, so are the cons. The negative implications of striving for perfection can include the following:

• overwhelm-Whether it's starting process or during the task that's the most difficult, we tend to overthink these situations

• Burnout-Having to use all our energy to get whatever we do spot on can increase exhaustion, which in extreme cases can lead to burnout

• Mood swings-These can include frustration and anger (and believe me, you do not want an angry Lucy)

• Becoming mute-Sometimes we struggle with how we explain the need to be perfect, so sometimes, I in particular don't say anything at all

Ways to help manage perfection better? 

After reading a post by Sarah church on LinkedIn, she gave lots of tips and tricks to help people managing perfection and the implications as mentioned above. But going forward, here is what I think should happen:

• Check in- this is important especially when asking on they’ll be able to cope with a task mentally. This is so then when I comes to simple tasks like facing up in a shop or doing household chores, they’ll be able to see that

• Be specific-setting clear instructions on each task. For example, at my day job of facing up, I need to know if it’s just the first two rows of each item or if it’s ALL of the products of that certain item, especially the ones right at the back. This is so that then I can know how much mental damage I can use to get that job done

• Progress not perfection-what I mean by that is that sometimes getting things done is better than getting it perfect. And I think going forward employers need to make it crystal clear on that as well, so then autistic people in particular don’t get to a point where they freeze or don’t start at all (which is what Sarah also mentioned in her post) 

And that was my post on perfection. Click the link below to see a video explaining further on how perfection can be unhealthy, and I hope this read has helped anyone who feels like they need to be pitch perfect all the time. 

https://youtube.com/shorts/b3bq2MMoQLA?si=e_E8meZcEO0YQ8H_

Also see the link below to the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower website, and how you can play your part to help those with a disability or illness that is not always obvious at first.

HDS - Global

See you soon for another blog. Until next time…

This is The Autistic Actress signing off :)