The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control: A Path to Peace and Power

by Katherine Morgan Schafler

Everything a child who does not feel loved does is done to answer this question: Am I worth loving yet? The child asks some version of that question indefinitely, but not forever. When the answer to the question continues to be perceived as “No,” the message is internalized: Oh, I’m not like other people who get to be happy and loved. I’m not worthy of love, safety, or goodness. An invisible switch is flipped. In the child’s unconscious mind, freedom to be who they are is no longer an option. It’s too unsafe and too destabilizing. With freedom off the table, two choices remain. The first choice is performance. They choose to play the part of someone who is worthy and hope to God no one finds out they’re pretending. The second choice is destruction. They choose to destroy themselves with the mentality of “If no one else cares about me, why should I?”