Perfectionism is a quality based on brain-washing and anxiety. It pushes a person to aim for something that does not exist. Perfectionism itself does not exist, because it is a subjective concept that will be different within a group of individuals, as well as within cultures, age groups, nationalities etc. Brain-washing is involved because it is a concept highly promoted by the media, to see certain products and ideas: anxiety is involved because those that believe it to exist will be doomed to perpetual failure in their efforts to achieve it – because it does not truly exist.

With perfectionism, there is no space for the more humane and accepting idea of “good enough”. It is an arena that promotes competition without a finishing line. Anxiety and stress become the dominant affect in such an arena; and where these emotions exist, we also get a great deal of unhappiness. At a rather extreme manifestation of this unhappiness, we can see children who are pushed by their parents to achieve, achieve and achieve, to the exclusion of creativity, fun and play. Such people perceive success to be around the corner, yet it is well known that your child will be more widely developed if their sense of achievement is tempered by the ability to play. Their brain will on a very physical level develop in a more balanced manner and they will experience a greater sense of happiness if they can find the balance of achievement with quality of life – a state that does not encompass perfection.

Also perfectionism does not allow for change: It exists within statis whereas humans and all things related to nature, and hence humans, changes from moment to moment. An element of narcissism exists within a person striving to be a perfectionist, and that means a level of developmental arrest took place at some point in your life. This can be due to any number of reasons but they will invariably reach a source point of someone close to you having high expectations – from whom you learnt to have high expectations of yourself and the world. And so the cycle continues ... until one of you decides to do something different and change the pattern.

Oh joy! My first full night of sleep after about 3 weeks of surviving on 3-4 hours per night.

This bout of insomnia has been particularly dire. I have recently realised that I am in the grip of a multi-faceted transition. There’s been no way of resisting it - it has been utterly overwhelming. It is one of those processes of nature that cannot be controlled and I have had to go with the flow of it as the Dynamic Feminine archetypal energy has taken hold. I am on the brink of moving from one stage of life, “the Mother”, into another, “the Crone”. This is a time of reassessment for me, where I am questioning what I want for the next decade of my life, what will take priority. It seems to be a time of my need to assert myself to a position of greater equality with others. I feel like I have something to say and I finally feel in a place to say it. It also seems to be a time of intense creativity for me, to the point of overflowing: I have a need to be creative. The creativity that is currently manifesting is my writing, and I am on a steep learning curve. Any point of stability I think I retain from the old life is rapidly disappearing and everything feels as though it has been thrown up into the air like the sticks in Spillikins. I can only wait to see how they will fall.

At the core of this upheaval is a loss of identity, which makes sense spiritually because I am letting go of one stage and moving into the next. What, or who I will be in the next stage of my life, is as yet unknown. All I do know is that I seem to want more of a say in the next stage of my life path than I have previously – and that is my Static Masculine archetype at play. Issues of death and growing “old” are also very much around and I wonder whether at some subconscious level it is difficult for me to sleep in case I never wake up again. The identity crisis is much more tangible and overt, as is the desire to be heard and to assert myself in the world more than previously. All of these things seem fitting for the new stage of development I am embarking on.

Who would have thought there was so much going on behind the mask of insomnia!

On the more practical here and now level, it is a struggle health-wise to be in this state of being. Given the work routines that we need to adhere to in current society, it is particularly difficult. My body wants instinctively to work in a more aligned way with nature, but my work routine does not allow for that. Consequently, consistent insomnia has resulted in a deterioration in my health in that as I become more tired, the less able I am in holding information in my head, the more irritable and intolerant I become, and the more clumsy and accident-prone I am. I usually incur a collection of injuries during my times of insomnia and this period has been no different.

My sense is that this level of disintegration had to happen to get me to realise the issues at play underneath the surface. Whilst I regard myself as a relatively conscious person, sometimes the universe still has to knock loudly at my door to get me to listen.

I would love to hear about your experiences, thoughts, feelings on the subjects of menopause, transitions, life changes, mortality or any other related issue.