Compliments are as normal as they can be terrifying. Some feverishly court them while they repulse another. We’re taught that we need to love ourselves, to find solace in our own self-image, while also told that others often know us better than we know ourselves. For those apt to distrust, and who are not only cynical but also self-loathing, both options may feel impossible, so out of reach that one may even come to treat both with disdain, rejecting them to mask their deep-seated needs and fears.

While all of us need approval and even admiration to some degree, some struggle to make peace with those needs, judging themselves for their apparently excessive nature. So, they use perfectionism, which can be thought of as a survival strategy, to cope. Perfectionism is an extremely individualistic pursuit; it’s the paradoxical belief that although one is fundamentally flawed, in the deepest way, they can, nevertheless, overcome their nature through strategic effort. This system can be considered a form of magical thinking because (a) both beliefs are largely baseless, meaning the reasoning behind them is flimsy while somewhat sensical on the surface, and (b) the sense of arrival, victory, or whatever is solely based on hope, as the individual can’t tell you what it constitutes or how one specifically gets........

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