None of this is to deny that perfectionism can be a destructive force in one’s life. Perfectionism can be harmful or helpful to anyone, depending on how that person manages it. Until we acknowledge the dichotomous and gendered nature of perfectionism, we are agreeing to sit idly as misguided men fly themselves straight into the burning sun, and as women’s wings are clipped off in the name of protection.

If you’re not leading a balanced life right now, that doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. You don’t have to “hit the gym” until you’re too tired to be mad or make longer lists in your gratitude journal until you stop wanting things. You can be angry and full of love. You can be grateful and want more. You do not need to balance any of this out.

You are allowed to want more and get it. Wanting more is healthy. Your desires are real and important, and they do not have to make sense to anyone other than you.

Wanting more may feel subversive and “dirty” to women who are taught that their perfectionism (read: ambition) is bad and wrong, in the same way that being sexually aroused can feel subversive and “dirty” to women who are taught that their sexual desire is wrong. Wanting more is an affront to everything you’ve learned about how to be a grateful, healthy, and balanced woman. A woman who wants more is ungrateful, a man who wants more is a visionary. A woman who seeks power is “power hungry,” a man who seeks power is an “alpha male.” These narratives are boring and raggedy. Be done.

Do not allow your ambition to be pathologised. Refuse to apologise for or disguise your insatiable desire to excel. Reject entirely the notion that you need to be fixed. Reclaim your perfectionism now.

If only for the briefest moment, allow yourself to consider a radical thought in a misogynist world: there’s nothing wrong with you.

The Perfectionists Guide to Losing Control by Katherine Morgan Schafler (Orion; £16.99) is out now.

Images: Getty

Why perfectionism is a gendered issue