The Birth Order Book (14 page)

George and the IRS

One of the most unusual procrastinators I ever counseled was a man we’ll call George. He came to me because he had not filed his income tax for the last four years. I asked him why. It turned out he had such an elaborate system for keeping records and receipts that reporting his income tax had become an insurmountable task. His family room contained several picnic tables nicely covered with shelf paper. Overflowing on each table were neatly stacked piles of receipts, notes, and bills of sale.

George kept telling himself the lie that he was dedicated to details and getting things right. Meanwhile, he couldn’t sleep because of having all those unpaid taxes hanging over his head. (Or, more precisely, the IRS hanging over his head!)

So many people who struggle with perfectionism will say things such as, “It’s no good,” or, “Oh, it isn’t much—it’s really nothing.” Those are sure signs of a perfectionist who is fending off criticism.

I wasn’t surprised to learn that George’s wife was the critical kind (and a perfectionist) who was always on his case about getting things fixed around the house. When she asked him to fix the toaster or the doorjamb or whatever, his reply was standard: “Don’t worry, honey. I’ll do it tomorrow.” Of course, tomorrow came, and the toaster and other things remained unrepaired.

George had so many uncompleted tasks staring him in the face that all he could do was tread water in the swimming pool of life. But no one can tread water forever, and finally George came to see me. He knew he was in trouble, and he wanted some help. After a number of sessions, I finally got him to attack his problems one at a time. He had to commit to fixing the toaster on a Monday, the door-jamb on a Tuesday, and so on.

Commit to finish one thing before starting another.

We agreed on one inviolate rule: he had to finish one job before he could start another. That’s always the key to helping the discouraged perfectionist who procrastinates: commit to finish one thing before starting another. I know that sounds overly simplistic, but it’s a basic principle that can do wonders if the procrastinating perfectionist has the commitment to carry it through. As I told George, “Beautiful cathedrals are built one brick at a time.”

George must have heard me because he did manage to change. He even committed to a definite schedule for cleaning up his taxes, one step—and one picnic table—at a time. The final irony of this story is that, after paying necessary penalties, George learned that the government owed
him
some money!

Spotting a Flaw at Fifty Paces

Remember my firstborn sister, Sally? I think you could tell from my description of her that she’s something of a perfectionist. She continually tries to keep the world straightened up, cleaned up, or shaped up. Here’s just one example of what I mean.

A few years ago I bought a boat—a nice nineteen-foot ski boat that I was looking forward to enjoying on Chautauqua Lake in the summertime.

I was as proud as any lastborn could be as I backed my new toy into the water and then secured it to the dock. I couldn’t wait to show my big sister what I’d purchased, and I didn’t have to wait long. Sally drove out from her home in nearby Jamestown and quickly came down to the dock to take a look at baby brother’s brand-new toy.

I didn’t say a word. I just stepped back and beamed, waiting for her comments.

Sally looked into the boat, and the first words out of her mouth weren’t “Gorgeous!” or “First-class!” or any number of other things that would have blurted out of my mouth had I been gazing on such a beauty for the first time. No, Sally’s first word was “Footprints!”

Footprints? What was she talking about?

Then I looked down to the boat, and yes, there they were— muddy footprints on the maroon carpeting. While launching the boat, I had apparently stepped into some mud and tracked it on the carpet and on some of the seat cushions as well.

Now if anyone else but Sally had made this rather critical appraisal on seeing my boat for the first time, I would have been irritated. Instead I just did my best impression of Mr. Rogers and said, “Yes, Sally, those are footprints. Can you say ‘footprints’?” And then I bent down and brushed the dried mud away with my hand.

My sister and I had a good laugh then, and we still do every time we remember the story. We both know that it’s her tendency, as a perfectionistic firstborn, to pick out the flaw in any situation. It isn’t that she’s mean or disrespectful. She just can’t help it—and, by her comments, she was actually trying to help.

Handling Failure

Fortunately, Sally’s perfectionism really leans more toward seeking excellence (more on this in the next chapter), even though she does have that flaw-picking quality. She hasn’t become a discouraged perfectionist by any means. But a lot of perfectionist flaw pickers
do
become discouraged and depressed, especially if they fail in any regard.

When you spot a flaw in your performance or appearance, do you equate it with failure and get down on yourself? Do you tell yourself that you’ve “done it again” or that you’ll never amount to anything?

How about you? When you spot a flaw in your performance or appearance, do you equate it with failure and get down on yourself? Do you tell yourself that you’ve “done it again” or that you’ll never amount to anything?

What I try to tell perfectionist clients (usually firstborn or only children) is that every human being who ever lived has failed at one time or another. It doesn’t matter how intelligent, talented, or fortunate you may be; the only way to avoid failure is to sit back and do nothing. But that’s a form of failure too, and it’s often what happens when a perfectionist becomes incapacitated by the fear of messing things up. What you do with occasional failure is strictly up to you. You can see failure as your deadly enemy, which holds you back and threatens your very existence, or you can see failure as a teacher and, in some cases, a blessing because it leads down another trail that brings you to success.

The only way to avoid failure is to sit back and do nothing.

Be Objective

The key to handling failure and making it a teacher rather than a destroyer is to look at it in a detached, objective way. Now I know that’s easier said and done by a lastborn who doesn’t have a perfectionist cell in his or her body. So if you’re a firstborn or an only child and failure really bugs you, you have to attack it systematically with what I call
cognitive discipline
: a methodical, organized approach to problem solving.

R
EFUSE
N
EGATIVE
S
ELF
-T
ALK

Don’t respond with “I knew this was going to happen! It always happens to me!” If you hear yourself thinking that kind of thing, stop and instead look closely at the situation. What caused the failure? What was your first mistake, which led to the second, and so on? Did you go against your better judgment? What can you do differently next time? As you analyze your failure or mistake, you will automatically be learning and setting yourself up to improve in the future.

D
ON’T
L
ISTEN TO
N
AYSAYERS

Of course, it’s hard when you fail and you get fired on by critics—your spouse, others in your family, your boss, your friends, or that busybody neighbor who seems to know everything you do. Remember that you’re under no obligation to believe or even listen to the people who are criticizing or condemning you.

If you’re a firstborn, keep in mind that you’ve been busy all your life living up to everyone else’s standards. You may have never even stopped to figure out exactly what you want out of life. You’ve been living up to the expectations of your parents, your teachers, your spouse, and so on. When you try to live up to everyone else’s expectations, you tend to believe what everyone else says about you.

We would never have heard of some of the world’s most famous people if they had listened to their critics early on:

Sir Winston Churchill, the prime minister who kept England afloat during World War II strictly on the strength of his brilliant oratory, was at the bottom of his class in one school and failed the entrance exams to another.

Pablo Picasso, the brilliant painter whose works command mind-boggling prices, was barely able to read and write at the age of 10 when his father yanked him out of school. Then a tutor came in to instruct him but gave up and quit in disgust because Pablo just didn’t have it.

Louis Pasteur was not the top student in his chemistry class.

Publishers told Zane Grey he could never be a writer.

Thomas Edison’s teachers concluded he was a few bricks short of a full load and tossed him out of school. His mother ended up homeschooling him.

There was that composer named Beethoven, whose teacher called him a “hopeless dunce.”

And let’s not forget Albert Einstein, whose theory of relativity changed the scientific world. He performed badly in almost all of his high school courses and even flunked his college entrance exams!
4

I have often imagined how it was for Einstein while growing up. The teacher would be leaning over little Albert at his school desk, saying, “Albert! What
are
you doing? You’re supposed to be practicing your multiplication tables. What on earth is this capital E and that equals sign and the little mc with a 2 after it? Can’t you handle 6 x 7?”

Refuse to Feel Guilty

Are You Good Enough for Yourself?

Ask yourself:

1. How do I handle failure?

2. What do I say to myself when I do fail?

3. How do I let others’ opinion of me influence my opinion of myself?

One more thing to remember as you battle failure: you are almost certainly battling guilt as well. Just ask yourself,
Do I feel guilty much of the time?
For most perfectionists, the answer is almost always yes. I have counseled many people whom I sometimes call “the guilt gatherers of life.” The common mistakes they make include:

piling one infraction on top of another
letting their children manipulate them
taking the blame when others are responsible
giving in to depression
believing they deserve to suffer
judging themselves by what others think of them
suffering rather than taking steps to change things

I have written extensively on dealing with guilt in other books. For more information, see
Pleasers
and
When Your Best Isn’t Good Enough.
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6
Perfect—or Excellent?

A
ll right, so reading the last chapter has convinced you that perfectionism is not a healthy way to live. You’re now aware (if you weren’t before) that you are a perfectionist to some degree, and you’re concerned that you may be in some trouble or even on thin ice.

Congratulations! You’ve made the first step toward making a change that could literally save your health or your life. It may even save you some friends. Discouraged perfectionists are often stubborn, opinionated, and strong-willed types who become known for telling it like it is. And what happens when you tell everyone like it is? People suddenly are too busy for lunch— and for much of anything else. Even your enemies don’t want to hang around long enough to insult you.

What happens when you tell everyone like it is? People suddenly are too busy for lunch—and for much of anything else. Even your enemies don’t want to hang around long enough to insult you.

And unless you can change your perfectionistic attitude, it won’t do any good to tell yourself you’ll just keep your mouth shut and put up with it. Try that and you will really lose your health. Your perfectionism will cause anxiety, and that anxiety, whether conscious or unconscious, has got to come out somewhere. Certain parts of your body will pay the price. That’s why so many firstborn or only children wind up going to see psychologists, and the first symptoms they notice are migraines, stomach disorders, or backaches. They are the worriers of life, the ones who develop colitis, ulcers, facial tics, and cluster headaches.

Dear Dr. Leman,

I can’t remember when I laughed so much while reading a nonfiction book. Laughed—I howled at some paragraphs in The Birth Order Book. You’ve answered several questions that have haunted me for a long time. . . .

Want clues to my birth order? I bought your book after wandering into a New York bookstore last Saturday, while fretting that the scarf I purchased a month earlier was navy blue—not black as I thought—and didn’t match my new black top coat. . . .

If that’s not enough: in my closet, dress shirts are on blue hangers, dark shirts on the left, lighter-colored shirts on the right; sport shirts are on brown hangers. I’m laughing so much thinking about this, I can hardly continue writing.

Surely you’ve guessed: I have no siblings. But here’s something curious that I discovered several years ago and wanted to alert you to: virtually all of my close friends are firstborn or only children. And with two exceptions, all fall in the much-younger, much-older groups—something that has always been apparent to me but I never understood until reading your book.