Therapy for perfectionism and performance anxiety in Atlanta
The standards worked. That is the problem. Nobody gives up a strategy that has been paying out for twenty years just because it is exhausting.
Dr. Aaron J. Kimble · PhD · MA · MBA · LPC · NCC · Georgia #LPC014380
In person in Midtown Atlanta, or by secure video in GA, FL, VT, SC and NY.
Eight years in practiceMore than 5,000 direct client hours with individuals, couples and families.
The standards are not the enemy. The tax is
Most people who come in about perfectionism are quietly worried that therapy will try to make them less ambitious. They have watched the standards produce results for two decades and they are not interested in being talked out of them. That is a reasonable position and I am not going to argue with it.
The work is not about lowering the bar. It is about the difference between having high standards and having your worth attached to meeting them. The first is a useful strategy. The second is a tax you pay on every success, which is why the promotion did not feel like anything and the win was over in an hour.
You will usually recognize the pattern in the details rather than the summary. Finishing something and feeling only relief. Reading criticism forty times. Not starting the thing you might be mediocre at. Being unable to rest without earning it first. None of that is a discipline problem, and more discipline is not the treatment.
I use cognitive behavioral therapy for the mechanics of it and acceptance and commitment therapy for the values piece, which is what stops this becoming a negotiation about standards. I also hold an MBA alongside the clinical training, which tends to be useful when the pressure is coming from an actual career rather than an abstraction.
You might be here because
- Finishing something produces relief and never satisfaction.
- You cannot rest without having earned it first, and you never quite have.
- You reread one line of criticism and skim the paragraph of praise.
- You avoid anything you might turn out to be average at.
- Delegating feels physically uncomfortable even when it is obviously correct.
- The promotion arrived and the dread did not lift.
- You are performing well and privately convinced you are about to be found out.
- Your worth and your output have become the same number.
- You are described as driven and it does not feel like drive from in here.
- You have been the reliable one so long you do not know what you would want otherwise.
What we work on together
Perfectionism itself
The mechanics of it: all-or-nothing standards, moving goalposts, and the way achievement gets recruited to answer a question about worth that it cannot answer.
Performance anxiety
Presenting, competing, examinations and the moments that matter most. Practical work on the anxiety and on what you are actually predicting will happen.
Impostor experience
Common in people who are genuinely good at the job. Usually a story about being found out rather than a real problem of competence.
Executives and demanding careers
Where the pressure is real and external rather than imagined. An MBA alongside the clinical training helps here, and I am not going to suggest you simply care less.
Athletes and performance environments
Sport, the arts, and any culture where admitting difficulty is treated as weakness. Including what happens when the performance identity ends.
Procrastination and avoidance
Which is usually perfectionism wearing a different coat. You are not lazy. Starting is expensive when anything short of excellent counts as failure.
Nobody gives up a strategy that has been working for twenty years because a therapist calls it unhealthy. The useful question is what it costs, and whether you would still choose it knowing the invoice.Dr. Aaron J. Kimble
How it works
A $25 consultation
Fifteen minutes, and a fair place to say out loud that you do not want to be made less ambitious. That is a workable starting position.
We keep the standards
We separate the standards from the self-worth attached to them. The first is a strategy worth keeping. The second is the part that is costing you.
In person or by video
The Midtown Atlanta office on Peachtree, or secure video, which tends to be the realistic option around a demanding schedule.
What you can expect from me
- No attempt to make you less ambitious. That is not the goal and it would not work anyway.
- Practical work. You will leave with something to test, which suits people who prefer to be doing something.
- Directness. If you are optimizing therapy the way you optimize everything else, I will point that out.
- Honesty about what is external. Some of the pressure you are under is real and is not a distortion to be corrected.
Fees & Insurance
$185 / individual · $220 / couples
Initial consultation $25. In network with Aetna, Anthem, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, CareSource, Cigna, Optum, and UnitedHealthcare. Sliding scale available.