The Academic Imperfectionist – Details, episodes & analysis

Friends, it's the 100th episode! So, isn't it about time we talked about what perfectionism is, and why it's a problem? It's over 4 years since I recorded the first episode of this podcast, and I've learnt a LOT about perfectionism from the 99 episodes I've released so far - not to mention from the many hundreds of hours of coaching people I've done. Leave that unfinished project, that untidy desk, and that incomplete task list, and join your old imperfectionist friend for some perfection-related truth bombs.

It's a familiar story. We're feeling stuck and out-of-our-depth with our writing, so we decide we'll go and do a bit more reading - just, you know, to soak up some of the wisdom out there and become better informed and therefore better qualified to continue writing. But sadly, reading for these reasons ends up making us feel less informed and qualified, not more. Sometimes, when we're stuck, we need to write, not read. And when we do read, we need to have an agenda. We need to know exactly why we're reading. Step away from the library card, and let your Imperfectionist friend talk some sense into you.

Reference:

Mullaney, T. S. and Rea, C. 2022: Where Research Begins: Choosing a Research Project that Matters to You (and the World) (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press).

Does your writing time ever turn into a stressful nightmare? You don't make the progress you hoped in the morning, which means you need to be even more productive in the afternoon, but then you end up too stressed to start, and then it gets so late that you write the day off as a failure and promise to do better tomorrow ... except you start tomorrow stressed about how little you accomplished the day before, and the cycle repeats itself. Take a deep breath, friends. The Academic Imperfectionist is here to show you a way out of this nastiness.

It's good to be grateful, right? Well, maybe ... but maybe not. Sometimes our gratitude is toxic: we use it to suppress and ignore negative feelings like anger, resentment, frustration, and dissatisfaction. Those negative feelings can hold the key to making important changes in our lives. You're as entitled to your negative feelings as you are to your gratitude. Put that gratitude journal down, and listen to your anger!

Athletes know that if they want to improve their performance, they need to incorporate rest into their training. You, on the other hand, are absolutely certain that if only you could write for 25 hours a day (which you can't because you're a terrible person) you'd be at the top of your game. Luckily for you, your Imperfectionist friend is here to talk some sense into you.

References:

Ansorge, R. 2022: 'Rest and recovery are critical for an athlete's physiological and psychological well-being', UCHealth Today (https://www.uchealth.org/today/rest-and-recovery-for-athletes-physiological-psychological-well-being/)

Pang, A. S.-K. 2016: Rest: Why You Get More Done When You Work Less (London: Penguin)

Do you ever tell yourself that it's your own fault that you don't have what you want in life, because you just don't have the willpower do get it? If so, willpower is not your problem, and thinking otherwise is stopping you from flourishing. Your problem is your lack of clarity and focus about what you want. Yes, really. Now, download the shit out of this episode and have a listen.

Never give up, right? Winners never quit and quitters never win! All nonsense, I'm afraid. The sensible advice is much more measured and boring: quit when it's appropriate to quit. But how do you know when it's appropriate to quit? And have we really got quitting all wrong? Listen on, friends, and find out.

Here's Annie Duke talking sense about quitting on The Spark podcast. Download the Core Values exercise here, and the 5 Whys exercise here.

Reference:

Duke, A. 2022: Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away (London: Penguin).

Did you know that your brain never devotes more than 0.5% of its power to important things like finding food, avoiding predators, thinking, perceiving, and feeling? And that this is because you're always bloody using the other 99.5% for comparing yourself unfavourably to other people?  Admittedly, I just made that up - but you do spend far too much time and energy on comparison. You know you shouldn't, because it makes you feel bad. But there's another, seldom-recognised reason to avoid comparing yourself to others: comparison is a completely inadequate and very biased tool for self-evaluation. 

I've been thinking: how might someone summarise the main bits of advice from all 85 (so far) episodes of this podcast? Gather round the virtual campfire, friends, and let's talk about those things that I can't seem to stop banging on about. They are:

• The reverse Golden Rule (don't treat yourself in a way that would be too disrespectful or unkind to treat another person)
• Understand your inner critic
• Being mean to yourself doesn't help you
• Reject binary thinking

Perhaps you're already familiar with what social psychologists have had to say about the fundamental attribution error, but did you know that it has a secret role in magnifying your anxieties about your worth? If you're prone to worrying about how everyone else in your field is more talented and smart than you are, then gather round. Your Imperfectionist friend is here to give you the real explanation - and the antidote.