I received the following response from Karen Olsen to the draft of a chapter she was reading on the Perfectionist Critic.

I am wondering if there is a slightly different sort of Perfectionist than those which you have developed in your chapter. After going through your exercises, I came to the conclusion that it is not so much that my critic is yelling at me and belittling me as it is that there is a fear of and a huge resistance to appearing to be, to exposing myself to be….. less than special and exceptional.

Remembering back to my childhood, I don’t remember not being able to get approval from either my parents or other adults in my life. What I remember is that I was always an exceptional student and that I felt special and that I became very attached to feeling special. “Feeling special” is probably entwined all through my sense of identity. Read the rest of this entry »