1st Edition
Acceptance and Commitment Skills for Perfectionism and High-Achieving Behaviors Do Things Your Way, Be Yourself, and Live a Purposeful Life
This book is essential for those who are prone to high-achieving, self-starting, and perfectionistic actions; people who relentlessly, persistently, and determinedly pursue their dreams, goals, and aspirations; people who hold their high standards, principles, and values close to their heart.
Chapter by chapter, you will learn acceptance and commitment skills to harness the power of perfectionism and high-achieving behaviors while living the life you want to live. You will learn how to be yourself, keep your fears in perspective, and do meaningful things without dwelling for hours on the different ways to make things right, postponing things because they aren’t ready, struggling for days with rumination, anxiety and stress, or wrestling periodically with harsh criticisms.
This book will show you how you can give your best, work hard, and push yourself when you deeply care about things without sacrificing your well-being, hurting your relationships, or compromising your health. You will learn when to engage in high-achieving actions in an effective, life-expansive, and skillful way. You will develop a new workable relationship with all those narratives about not being good enough and treat yourself with kindness, compassion, and caring. Most importantly, you will find that you can be yourself without losing yourself.
SECTION I What’s Wrong With Caring Deeply?
1 Why Bother With This Book?
2 Doing Things Perfectly Makes Sense!
3 Others Are Wrong, You’re Right
4 Flipping the Coin
5 All Types of High-Achieving Actions
SECTION II Unpacking Your Personal History
6 How Come You Care So Much?
7 The Many Shades of Fear
8 Mistakes, Errors, Flaws
9 A Special Type of Fear
10 Mental Rubrics
11 Personal Narratives
SECTION III Harnessing the Power of High-Achieving and Perfectionistic Actions
12 The Future of Caring Behaviors
13 What Are Your Precious Values?
14 Does It Really Matter?
15 Important Questions, Important Answers
16 One Year From Now
17 "Doing Things Right" Is the Right Thing to Do, at Times
18 What Game Are You Playing?
SECTION IV The Workability Game
19 Learning About It
20 Playing It
21 Committing to It
SECTION V Pause and Play
22 The Great Escape
23 Fleeting Feelings
24 Seizing and Freezing
25 Overly Protective Friends
26 To Buy or Not to Buy?
27 Hold Them Lightly, Really!
28 99 Percent
29 This-Or-That Thoughts
30 Minding and Unwinding
31 Mini-Me Stories
32 Terrible Feelings
33 Pleased to Meet You!
34 Plus and Minus
35 Don’t Go Down the Rabbit Hole!
36 Daring to Be Kind!
37 Vulnerabilities or Liabilities?
38 Less Chasing, More Choosing
39 When-Then Thoughts
40 Tough Choices Need Kindness
SECTION VI Onward and Upward!
41 Messy Moments
42 Living With Not Knowing
43 Undoing Decidophobia
44 Tackling Procrastination
45 Tough Love!
46 Let’s Move
47 To Quit or Not to Quit
48 Finding Your Rhythm
49 Little Tidbits
50 Sweet Contradictions
51 Sugarcoating Moments
52 O-VER-RE-SPON-SI-BIL-I-TY
53 Doing Less, Living More
Biography
Patricia E. Zurita Ona, Psy.D., "Dr. Z.," is a psychologist specialized in working with and creating compassionate, research-based, and actionable resources for overachievers and overthinkers to get them unstuck from worries, fears, anxieties, perfectionism, procrastination, obsessions, and ineffective playing-it-safe actions.
Dr. Z. is the founder of the East Bay Behavior Therapy Center, a boutique practice, where she offers therapy and coaching services based on acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and contextual behavioral science. Dr. Z. has been nominated a Fellow of the Association of Contextual Behavioral Science because of her contributions to the applications of ACT to specific fear-based struggles. Dr Z gave a TEDX talk titled ‘Stop Playing-It-Safe and Start Living’ at Gunn High School in 2023: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gdXbMoTEZg.
"This book is an incredible resource for anyone struggling to balance their drive for high achievement with their wellbeing and relationships. Underpinned by behavioral science, Dr. Z. invites you to consider when to follow perfectionistic actions and when to disentangle from them. She shows you chapter by chapter how to play the workability game while building a fulfilling life. This is my go-to text for any person that wants to learn how to make their high standards work for them over the long term."
Jonny Say, ACT and Compassionate-focused Therapist
"This fabulous book teaches you how to live a vital and meaningful life while pursuing the high standards that you find important and without losing yourself in the process. Using Acceptance and Commitment skills, Dr. Z. provides you with a compassionate frame to make sense of your perfectionistic actions, keep them in check, and do what works. You will learn to lean into your values and make room for anxieties and fears of being a failure, without losing your drive to achieve."
Kim Rockwell-Evans, Ph.D., OCD and Anxiety Specialists of Dallas
"In a relatable, compassionate, and clear way, Dr. Z. deconstructs a complex topic. Grounded in acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), she guides you through the nuances of perfectionism and teaches you how to go beyond the labels of good and bad or right and wrong, so you can create a values-driven and workable relationship with perfectionistic actions. A must read for anyone that wants to harness the power of high achieving actions while living a fulfilling life!"Michael Heady, LCPC; Co-Director of the Anxiety and Stress Disorders Institute of Maryland
"This book is vital for anyone who has wrestled with holding themselves to high personal standards while at the same time drowning in the overwork and overwhelm that such high standards bring. It’s a practical guide that digs into why it’s so hard for high-achievers to step back and let go, and how to embrace progress over perfection to live a calmer, less anxious, and happier life. It’s a book that I will absolutely recommend to all of my self-confessed perfectionist clients, colleagues, and friends."
Ellen Jackson, Workplace and Coaching Psychologist, Podcaster
"If you’re suffering from the chronic stress and strain of perfectionism, help is at hand. But this not just any old help. This is wise, practical, realistic help, based not on pop psychology, but solid science. Within these pages, Patricia Zurita Ona will guide you, with great wisdom and compassion, in breaking free from the shackles of perfectionism, and building a life of freedom and fulfilment. You’re in good hands. Enjoy the journey."
Russ Harris, Author of The Happiness Trap
"This is another wonderful book by Dr. Z. It is really going to help many of my clients."
Dr. Treegoob
