Dr. Ellen Hendrickson, the original host of Savvy Psychologist, makes her return to the show to discuss her new book How to Be Enough. Monica dives deep with Dr. Hendrickson into the roots of perfectionism, its impact on self-worth, and practical strategies for embracing self-acceptance. Discover the two pillars of unhealthy perfectionism, how hustle culture exacerbates self-criticism, and actionable steps to move toward a healthier mindset.
Dr. Ellen Hendrickson, the original host of Savvy Psychologist, makes her return to the show to discuss her new book How to Be Enough. Monica dives deep with Dr. Hendrickson into the roots of perfectionism, its impact on self-worth, and practical strategies for embracing self-acceptance. Discover the two pillars of unhealthy perfectionism, how hustle culture exacerbates self-criticism, and actionable steps to move toward a healthier mindset.
Savvy Psychologist is hosted by Dr. Monica Johnson. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
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MONICA: Today I'm super excited because we have Dr. Hendrickson here who was the OG host of Savvy Psychologist. And I'm sure you're super excited. I was super excited as well to find out what she's been doing since she's been gone. And one of those things has been writing another book, which I've been spending my holiday season reading, and it's called How to Be Enough.
Okay. And so Dr. Hendrickson, can you tell us what led you to this book? Who is this book for? What's it about? We're really excited to hear about it.
ELLEN: Yeah, for sure. No, I'm excited to be back. Yeah, this feels like home. yeah, so I've been spending a long time writing this book and it's about, as the subtitle implies, self acceptance for self critics and perfectionists. And I wrote it because, I write about my own problems, first of all, so I wrote this book for me.
But my first book was about social anxiety and the chapter that really resonated with readers and audiobook listeners was, hopefully the whole book resonated, but I got a lot of feedback about the book. perfectionism and how, wow, I never thought about that before, like that really is the heart of social anxiety.
And so that got my nerdy brain interested in perfectionism. And as I, learned and researched more about it, not only started to resonate myself, I was like, Oh, I think this is, this explains a lot about me. but also really helped me be a better clinician and understand my clients, on a, I think a, deeper level.
It's interesting because, so I work, I'm a clinical psychologist at an anxiety specialty center. And nobody ever comes in and says oh, I'm a perfectionist. I need help. I need help with perfectionism. Everything has to be perfect. People come in and say, I'm not reaching my potential.
Like nothing's ever really, I'm not really doing things well enough anywhere. Like I have so many things on my plate and I feel like I'm not doing any of them well. Or I feel like I'm always failing, or I feel like I'm falling behind. There's just this, like real, silent ep or not so silent, in the therapy room, epidemic of not feeling good enough.
And that truly is the heart of perfectionism. It's not about striving to be perfect. It's about never feeling good enough. And so I wanted to learn more about me, but also write this to help all the folks who I sit across from, in the office and the, what I'm guessing to be many, folks just like them.
MONICA: Based on the research that you've done, like how would you define perfectionism? Cause I see a lot of different things in the media.
ELLEN: I'm really glad you asked that. Yeah. No, because perfectionism, I feel Can be good, right? Like it's everybody's favorite weakness in a job interview. what's your biggest weakness? Oh, I'm such a perfectionist. and indeed it, can be good. The heart of, healthy perfectionism is a personality trait called conscientiousness.
And that is a tendency to do things well and thoroughly. To be responsible, to be diligent, I call it the world's least sexy superpower, but it is indeed the one to choose, for, research has shown, for a good life, both objectively and subjectively. so healthy perfectionism is when we aim high, we strive for excellence for the sake of excellence, we care deeply, so all those things make the world go round.
Please keep doing those things. where it tips over into unhealthy. Perfectionism is when we start to do two things. And now we're getting into the work of Drs. Ross Schaffrin, Zafra Cooper, and Christopher Fairburn from when they were colleagues at Oxford University. And there, they say the two pillars of unhealthy perfectionism are self criticism, which I think needs no definition, but, in, in perfectionistic self criticism is particularly harsh and personalistic.
And the second pillar is something that was actually new to me, and that was self criticism. a, trait, or not a trait, a, that was a tendency called over evaluation. And that is when we start to conflate our performance with our character. it's, Sorry, you're going to have to edit this.
MONICA: Hey, it's, okay.
ELLEN: it's when we conflate our worth with our performance. It's I am what I do. And so my, one of my lines is, forgive my grammar, but it's when I did good equals I am good, or I did bad equals I am bad. And we can over evaluate anything. So classic examples are the Stryver student who derives their value from their grades.
I had a client who came in and he, was very anxious, like disproportionately anxious about his quarterly evaluation. And I, we finally figured out that it was because he saw it not only as a referendum on his work, but on his own character, like his person. I'm working with a musician right now.
right now who botched a performance recently and is taking it to heart because he is only as good as his last performance. we could think of the athlete who's only as good as their last game. We can really over evaluate anything. It could be how healthy we ate today, whether, our social performance, whether or not we were awkward at the holiday party.
And so it's, over evaluation is whenever we think we have to perform as superbly as possible to be sufficient as a person. And that's really the heart of unhealthy perfectionism.
MONICA: it's so great that you bring that up. Cause so many of my patients are coming to my mind as you're talking about that, especially because there's such a push for productivity and hustle culture and, that sort of energy. And so a lot of people start to identify with their achievements in a lot of different ways.
So I'm wondering, do you have any tips for the over evaluation or the self criticism?
ELLEN: Yeah, absolutely. So for the overvaluation, I had a lot of fun writing this, researching and writing this story in the book. I tell the story about Kareem Abdul Jabbar and his time at UCLA with the legendary basketball coach, John Wooden, and there, John Wooden's record with the team was, so superlative, so exemplary that, these two researchers, Drs.
Roland Tharp and Ronald Gallimore, sat in the stands for the 1974 75 practices just to see what Coach Wooden did. what's the secret sauce? how does he do this? how is his, how does he get such a good performance, speaking of performance, out of this team? And what they discovered was interestingly, that he very seldom praised or criticized his players.
He didn't say things like, good job, or no, you stink, instead, what he did was he thanked them. taught, he gave information. And so he would say things like pass from the chest, take lots of shots where you might get them in games, pass the ball to someone short. And it was almost never focused on the person or the player, it was focused on the action and the job at hand.
And so what we can take from that playbook is to focus on the work for the work's sake. We're never gonna completely separate, our ourselves from our work. Of course, we're going to be proud of a good performance. Of course, we're going to be disappointed when things don't go as we wanted it to.
But if we can make our performance less personal and make it about the work, to take the stance of a sculptor, eye in a block of marble, and say, what would make this thing better? What would make this work better? That will get us a long way. And ironically, striving for excellence for the sake of excellence, as opposed to prove ourselves, usually makes the work better.
MONICA: Oh, wow. That's really, that's a profound thought to have. Cause I know so many people are looking for the praise, and even what I said about the push for productivity and things like that, we're externalizing so many things. If I don't get enough likes on something, if I don't have enough people telling me I did that thing really well, then it makes me feel bad about myself and that I'm not enough.
ELLEN: And I think you've hit on a really important point there, because then when we do externalize it and we base our self worth on the praise or the admiration or the likes, we've outsourced our self worth to other people, to the reactions of others. And that leaves us in a very low power position.
Whereas if we Focus on, again, the work for the work's sake, on what we can control, that puts us in a much higher power position. by focusing on striving for excellence for the sake of excellence, we can do a double whammy and not only probably will the performance actually be better, when, we don't have ourselves, like our own self worth wrapped up in it, but also we're not outsourcing it to, the people around us, then that, that helps buffer us in two ways.
Thanks.
MONICA: Are there any tips that you have for how to shift your mindset in that way of I'm doing this for the sake of doing it?
ELLEN: Sorry, you're gonna have to edit this too. let's see. Can't
Yeah. Okay here let's do this. Okay. Yeah. No, definitely. So I think we can Okay, it's really easy in 2025 to look at, okay, to determine what I should be doing based on, social media, on the opinions of others, on things that might not even really be relevant. Our own values. I was talking to another podcast host, and she was reflecting on how, she always had felt like she had to follow this rule of, I need to have a beautiful home, even though she had two toddlers.
And so she would see these, beautiful interiors on, Pinterest or on Instagram and think, Oh, my God, that means now I have to do this too. And she And it really, lifted the weight from her shoulders when she realized that's not even what she wanted. she wanted a climbing wall in her living room.
She wanted to have her toddler's toys everywhere. she wanted a welcoming, active home, not a kind of generically beautiful home. And so I think it can be much easier to focus on the work for the work's sake when it's something that we do. either want to do, or, this, is not a perfect world, we can't do things we want to do all the time, to, to, and the things that we do have to do, like our paid work, or whatnot, to find the thing that we do value about it, the thing that we find meaningful, or important, or fun, and to run towards that part.
of the work. And that is how we can focus on the works for the work's sake as opposed to, yeah, trying to make this, again, a referendum on ourselves.
MONICA: seems like part of what you and I are both bringing up is that the perfectionism isn't just something that exists within the person, but it seems to be also a response to, another person, the greater society, those sorts of things. So it doesn't just seem like it's a. There also seems to be an interpersonal dynamic that can happen with perfectionism.
ELLEN: For sure. Yeah, no, and this is, this gets into some of the work of, doctors Thomas Curran and Andrew Hill. and essentially there, They, okay, so they had this really interesting study come out in 2019 where they tracked 27 years of data and tracked, how, to what extent do people, are people being perfectionistic, in our society, and they found that it is on a, just a rocket launch of a trajectory, and I think, it makes sense, we, every human being.
reacts to the situation they're put in. And so when we find ourselves in a, uber capitalistic, society where we are encouraged to achieve and perform and compete, to ever higher standards, then of course we're going to respond with some perfectionism. but Interestingly, I, when, we, put all of our eggs in the basket of performance and need to perform, feel like we need to perform so well that we are set apart, that we are different than everyone else, then ironically, we end up alone.
And so we might be singular. But we also end up separate. And that, I find, is what brings a lot of people into the office. That they feel like they, on paper, they might look like they're heading out of the park, they're doing a lot of things well, they are thriving in, many ways, but they don't feel like it.
They feel lonely. They feel isolated. They feel separate. And, I feel like that is the, one of the true side effects of a society that makes us strive and perform and achieve to ever, higher standards.
MONICA: and I find that really interesting because, we see all of these headlines about the loneliness epidemic that we're in, and to hear you make that connection between, striving for perfection and how it leads us towards a pathway of being more lonely. Because I don't see any performance standards around community.
You know what I mean? No one's going Hey, let's make friends and have that be a goal. Or let's have a thriving abundant community that supports us. And that's an achievement. Like that's not, doesn't really align with where we're at with our American values.
ELLEN: Absolutely. Yeah. No. And it's, I find it, it's also really ironic because, perfectionism is, what research is called like interpersonally motivated, meaning it's actually trying to help us belong, but it is guiding us down the wrong path. to get there because it tells us the lie that we have to perform as superbly as possible to get people to like us.
But, like you said, community, let's, what, okay, let's think about why your friends are your friends, are you friends with them because they're good at things? is it because they're, like, skilled at conversation or they always pick a good restaurant, or they always remember your birthday?
none of those things are bad, but I'm guessing that's not why you are. like them. Like probably you like your friends because of how they make you feel. Like they make you feel connected and supported and like you can be yourself. But perfectionism, the lie of perfectionism tells us to double down on performance.
Even, our social performance are, like seeming to, like striving to be like articulate or to have good taste or to, be stylish. it tells us that we have to do the things that we Double down on that performance in order to earn our way into belonging, as opposed to, focusing on connecting, focusing on just simply enjoying each other.
plus when. we double down on performance and try to put our best foot forward. That also implies that we're hiding what's not going so well. And that's called perfectionistic self presentation. When we show what's going we hide what's going poorly. And then that makes us unrelatable, right? It, makes us come across as superhuman or intimidating and that continues to contribute to us being isolated and disconnected.
that's, that, like you said, perfectionism might look like a personal problem but relates an interpersonal problem. there's, again, that we might be singular but then we're separate. So what we can do there is to try to, pump up the vulnerability, right? And I know that is a word that kind of gets tossed around a lot.
we can define vulnerability as being willing to reveal your thoughts. actions, emotions, that might, that could result in criticism or rejection, taking a leap of faith that they won't. with the people we want to be closer to, thinking about that, the word vulnerable, literally, being vulnerable is being at risk.
We put ourselves at risk when we disclose something vulnerable, but it's letting people see some of the mess that's going on. And it signals two things. So being a little bit vulnerable signals, I trust you, not to judge me or to reject me. And it also signals, we are the same. I am not better than you.
we're not in some kind of like coach, mentee relationship. We're not in a teacher student relationship. We are equal. And that is what the foundation of friendship, is, built on trust and equality.
MONICA: Oh, absolutely. And I'm glad that you bring this up because something that I see happen a lot is, when people are trying to be vulnerable, instead they, trauma bond instead, they're like, let me tell this new person my deepest, darkest secret. And then when they are rejected, cause that's not.
The best way to go about doing that then that increases like negative feelings about yourself. And one of the, so part of my story is I'm a dbt therapist. So part of what I do is radically open dbt, which is for people who are over controlled and we have something called the match plus one skill.
So what I say, so what I say to my patients is, okay, where's your starting point with this person? it. Plus one it, go one step beyond, where your relationship is with that person. And then once you're connected on that level, you keep doing that until you reach a spot where it's it no longer feels good or right to move forward another step.
ELLEN: Amazing. Yes. Love Match Plus One, for sure. Cause that, cause, yeah, cause, disclosure, vulnerable disclosure, is, personalistic, for sure. It should be about us, but like you said, we don't want to take that all the way to the trauma bonding, first. Because, getting to know someone is also reciprocal.
That we, say, here is a little bit of my mess. I trust you we're the same. And ideally that person will say, oh yeah, oh, here's a little bit of my mess too. And now they're, now, we're, now we've done this reciprocally and then you again. Yeah. Keep, going as you are comfortable or as you, are, would, like to get to know this person.
but to, yeah, make sure that the level of disclosure remains you. Roughly equal. Absolutely.
MONICA: And so this brings me into something that I'm always trying to do, which is like bust myths. Cause there's a lot of myths that I see floating around online. What are some things that you see going on in terms of what people are doing for perfectionism that probably isn't working very well? and then maybe we can talk about what to do instead.
ELLEN: Yeah, for sure. so I'm so happy you brought this up because okay, so I imperfection is Having a moment, which I think is amazing and I have noticed that the advice around perfectionism tends to be along the lines of Hey, you need to stop when things are good enough. Or you really need to lower your standards.
And when it get, because the heart of clinical perfectionism is that over evaluation is, seeing ourselves as defined by our performance, that's not going to resonate. with somebody with perfectionism. We're absolutely not going to settle for what we perceive as a subpar or mediocre performance because that would make us subpar or mediocre.
again, I think it's a great question. Absolutely important that imperfection is having a moment, but I think telling people to lower their standards or settle for good enough is, not going to go off well. I've certainly seen that in the therapy room for sure. When I first started learning how to treat perfectionism, many moons ago, I suggested to a client that he have an 80 percent productive day instead of a 110 percent productive day.
And he looked at me like I had just suggested that he pull out his toenails. I think we need to, be careful about how we. how we phrase that. And so what we can do instead is to, to make some room for mistakes. And that's different. Then lowering our standards, please keep your high standards keep striving for excellence But know that we can't have a we can't have zero mistakes so I in the I'll tell a story about a client I have who is a Pediatrician and so she came in The other week and was just lambasted basting herself about having made a misdiagnosis.
and I, her job is very important. You would not want to tell her to lower her standards. You don't, she would never settle for, eh, I did some, good enough care of patients or ah, I missed a few things, ah, whatever. that's not, appropriate. However, you 25 years.
By all accounts, she is an excellent doctor, but with this particular case, she had misdiagnosed appendicitis, which was, pretty serious for simple constipation. And so she had sent this patient home, and then she ended up needing to go to the emergency room later. and everything was fine, but my client was being so hard on herself.
She was saying, I should get my brain examined. Maybe I should retire early. Like I'm a terrible doctor. And so there, we talked about okay, keep your high standards. But what's the, over a 25 year career, what's the percentage of misdiagnoses that you would be expected to make? It can't be zero.
And so she decided that, even, just 1%, just even just allowing herself a tiny bit of wiggle room makes a huge difference between that and zero percent. I'm never allowed to make any mistakes. So we're keeping the high standards. But folding in some room for the inevitable blips and bloops and errors of life.
Not because we're not good enough, but because we're human. And that's, mistakes are part of what's going to happen. Sometimes things don't go well.
MONICA: And I'm glad you bring that up and you separate those two things because, oftentimes when I'm working with people, they usually have idols that they look up to and none of those idols have a perfect record. I'm like, if you look at Michael Jordan or Simone Biles or, Jeff Bezos or whoever it is.
Nikola Tesla. It's like they've all failed a lot. They've all lost a lot of games, but we still look at them as some of the best in whatever their field is.
ELLEN: no, and I honestly, and weirdly, I think that the fact that they, have failed, or have struggled, or have not always hit it out of the park, makes them, More relatable and more even aspirational. I think, when we're looking up to someone who does seem perfect, they, yeah, they somehow seem superhuman.
it's not even possible to aim for that. And so I think when, we. Look at, yeah, the, best of the best, and see that they have struggled it, ironically makes it more likely that, maybe we could, be, like reach great heights like that as well.
they can be super, they can be the, they can be the best of the best and still be human.
MONICA: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So in reading your book myself, I think your book is good. what would you say, to a person thinking, Oh, I don't know if this perfectionism thing really, matches me? Because when I was reading, I was like, I think we all, to some degree, fall under the self criticism or the over evaluation.
ELLEN: For sure. Yeah. No, I think again, most of the people who I see in the office absolutely have some perfectionism. And I think it makes, sense. it's again, we all, react to the situations we're put in. So anyone living in 2025 in, our society is probably going to have, some of those, same reactions.
I think specifically self criticism is something that everybody. can relate to. And there, I, take the subtitle of the book, pretty literally, the self acceptance for self critics, and perfectionists. But there, I want to emphasize that everybody criticizes themselves from time to time. in fact, self criticism is the core of human's ability to self regulate.
a healthy dose of self judgment, helps us evaluate our behavior, modify it, and ultimately get along with other people. we can't stop criticizing ourselves, but what we can do is to learn not to take it so seriously or so literally. for example, I, know that my brain is wired just to be a little bit more self critical than the average bear, just like some people are wired to be, introverted or extroverted or optimistic or pessimistic, I think a lot of us are wired to be self critical.
But, I think that, that is key, that we can say, oh, this is just how I'm wired when the self criticism starts going. We can think this is just what my brain does. It doesn't mean it's true. It doesn't mean these are facts. It doesn't mean I have to listen to it and go on some self improvement journey.
I can just treat my self critical thoughts like I treat the music at a coffee shop. It's there. I can hear it, but I don't have to, metaphorically sing along. I can just let them pass through my brain and be like, Oh, that's, right. That's what my brain does. That's, how I'm wired.
And I know for me, that, that true self acceptance, knowing that this is just how my brain is wired, has helped me, yeah, not take my self criticism as a burden. literally, and that is very freeing.
MONICA: love what you're saying because there's a lot of nuance in it. I think a lot of people think that they have to remove parts of who they are versus learn how to accept and live with them. And what you're describing is what I say to my patients all the time about, we want to take the bite out of it.
So the bark is always going to be there. It's the bite that really hurts. And by using these interventions, that's what happens.
ELLEN: Yeah, absolutely. No, and we, we can do that with, self criticism. We can do that with, fear of failure. we can see it as this is something my brain does. and we don't have to exactly lessen Those things we can, instead of trying to change them or make them go away, we can change our relationship.
to them. And this, gets into, some exceptions and commitment therapy and the technique of cognitive diffusion. but like there, I've had, great success with clients who, and help them play with their self critical thoughts and make them like a little bit like irreverent or a little bit ridiculous.
not to make the thoughts. but to just emphasize that they're thoughts. So for example, like I have a client, who likes to picture animal from the Muppets, like banging his drum set and yelling his self critical thought, which is everyone will judge you. And then I have another client who, takes her self critical thought, which is you're going to let everyone down and pictures it.
on a coffee mug, and then she'll picture herself taking a little sip from the coffee mug whenever she has that thought. So the thoughts are all still there, we're doing some true self acceptance here, but not, but we can play with the thoughts to emphasize that they're just thoughts, they're not, Like some indictment of us.
MONICA: Absolutely. Thank you so much for taking the time to come here today and talk about how to be enough. anyone who wants to get your book, where can they find it? When is it available? do you have any social medias where people can know what you're up to and what you're doing?
ELLEN: Sure. Yeah. It's out January 7th, and you can get it wherever you like to get books. It's in hardback ebook audiobook. So if you're not tired of my voice, you can listen to me, narrate the book and, to find me online. The best place where I post most often is my Substack, which is called How to Be Good to Yourself When You're Hard on Yourself.
Oh, and you can also find me on Instagram.
MONICA: Oh, this is so wonderful. Thank you again, everyone. Please go out and purchase the book. I was lucky enough to get an advanced copy and it's been a great read and I'm definitely going to be recommending it to some of my patients.
ELLEN: I'm so happy to be here. Thanks for having me back. Feels like home. And it was a delight to talk to you. Thank you so much.