Perfectionism In High School

Being raised in a perfectionist’s home, my older siblings got straight As, and it was an expectation that I was prepared to achieve. Nothing lower was acceptable to either me or my parents. Anything lower than an A meant that I had made a mistake. It meant I had failed. That’s the way I felt about grades. Because of this, throughout all of high school, I was under tremendous pressure, especially during final tests and projects. Looking back on these experiences helped me to realize that I was worrying for the wrong reasons. Through all of high school, all I worried or cared about was my grades. I didn’t care about learning or the projects I was doing. All that mattered to me was that I got that A on my report card. I learned because it was required to learn to earn an A but not at all for the right reasons. Many students come to Brigham Young University, taught that it is a requirement to get …show more content…
In some views, this could be true, but it depends on your definition of success. If all success is is your GPA, then being a perfectionist might be your pathway. However, to me success is much more. It is all your accomplishments and achievements both related to schoolwork and outside of school. So, even though I don’t agree that perfectionism is the best path to success, I do acknowledge that it is a way to success. Perfectionists tend to get all their work done on time, do exceptional work, and are always prepared. They are generally motivated and can get large quantities of work done. They will go to almost any length to get that A. Now, let me reiterate what I said earlier. Getting A’s is not bad. But when we let it consume us and our work, it can pull us off focus from our end goal, while perfectionism may help us reach a certain level of success, if we focus on learning we can reach a higher level of