Reflection
Perfectionism and the Pastry Police
Perfectionism can look like caring deeply about doing something well. But sometimes it becomes something else entirely, where trying harder stops helping and it becomes very difficult to stop.
When trying harder stops helping
I had a very good example of this when I decided to make a two-tier stacked cake for my birthday party. Not a normal birthday cake, obviously. The plan was an eight-inch carrot cake with a six-inch matcha cream cheese cake on top.
I have a rule that I do not bake after 9 p.m. because I know what happens when I get tired. I make more mistakes, get frustrated, try harder to fix them, and somehow become increasingly determined to solve something at exactly the point when I am probably least equipped to solve it. So, naturally, that evening I was still baking after 9 p.m.
Then I tried to put the crumb coat on. Mine was not cooperating. Instead of stopping and wondering whether I needed a different approach, I kept trying to make it work, applying increasing amounts of sheer willpower to a problem that was clearly not going to be solved by pushing harder.
The strange thing was that I knew what was happening. I knew I was tired. I knew I was probably making things worse. And yet there was still this very strong feeling of, I just need to fix this.
My partner could see it too. At some point, while I was locked in mortal combat with the buttercream, he essentially staged a bakery intervention.
“Ça suffit!”
“Arrête!”
“Police de la pâtisserie!”
It was basically, put down the palette knife and nobody gets hurt.
I burst out laughing. Suddenly I could see how ridiculous it was that I was treating buttercream like an actual emergency. So I put down the palette knife and went to bed.
At around five the next morning, I woke up knowing I needed fresh buttercream and a different approach. I also knew I could not let the cake take over the whole day. I was going to the Jung Museum with a friend, so I gave myself some time limits for what I had left to do.
This time I had a plan, some limits and fresh buttercream. And it worked.
When perfectionism becomes pressure
The thing I noticed afterwards was that my perfectionism had not actually helped me make a better cake. It had made me less flexible. Perfectionism is often described as having high standards or caring about doing something well. Sometimes it is. But there is another version of it that feels much more like pressure.
I need to get this right.
I need to fix this.
I cannot stop yet.
That feels different from simply wanting to do something well. There is less room in it and much more urgency. Perfectionism can also make persistence feel like the only answer. Keep going. Try harder. Push through. But persistence and sheer willpower are not always the most useful response. Sometimes the better move is to stop, reset or change approach.
What makes getting it right feel so important?
Sometimes it is worth getting curious about what has become so important in that moment. What am I imagining will happen if I get it wrong? Am I worrying about what someone else will think? Has doing something well become connected to feeling competent or good enough?
There was some social pressure too. It was for a party. But it was still my cake. It was not for a customer. Nobody was paying me. Most of the pressure was coming from me.
At the party, one of the guests looked at the finished cake and said, “It’s leaning slightly.”
I looked at it. It was.
“You know what?” I said. “I’m okay with that.”
And I really was.
Someone else had noticed the imperfection, I could see it too, and nothing bad happened. Maybe that is part of loosening perfectionism. Can we tolerate something being imperfect long enough to discover that nothing terrible happens?
And there was a lot that had gone right. The cake was properly stacked with dowels, the buttercream was holding, and I had made the two-tier cake I had set out to make. It was enormous, covered in pale buttercream, decorated with little pink and yellow flowers, with strawberries and raspberries piled on top. It was also tall enough that when it came time to blow out the candles, I had to get on a step ladder.
I could see the whole cake instead of only the bit that was not perfect.
I think that is the difference I am interested in. Not caring less, but having enough space to notice when persistence is helping and when something can simply be imperfect and still be okay.
Sometimes trying again is the right thing to do. Sometimes the whole approach needs changing. And sometimes it is after 9 p.m., the buttercream has won, and the most useful thing you can do is go to bed.
Preferably before the Police de la pâtisserie have to be called.