When is enough, enough?

Another week on and I am still having what I refer to as a 'blip'. I've been on a bit of a downward spiral for the last couple of weeks and as I have another therapy session tomorrow, I thought I may as well fill you in on my week!

I had three or so great weeks recently, I felt fantastic and threw myself back into my old ways - I think this is perfectly natural, we feel 'normal' and like we can take on the world. I am a standard driven person and will always push myself hard, often to extremes and as we know that's why I ended up where I did. So a little taste of the old me led me to throw myself back into work, doing longer days than I should and I was 'hooked' again. This immediately had a detrimental effect and almost ground me to a halt. Since then I have still been working every day but in the past week have struggled to get out of the front door and those feelings of anxiety have been creeping back in. I have felt physically ill and mentally exhausted. I can't explain it and I certainly can't control it but one thing is clear, in order to manage this condition effectively I need to find some way to lower my standards (whilst still keeping them good!) and to know my boundaries.

Very high standards or perfectionism go hand in hand with stress, anxiety, fatigue and self criticism, so why would anyone want to be like this? Last year I was not only like this at work but with my social performance, my business, my work birthday buffet(!), infact, everything!

What I need to now do is ask myself a different set of questions. Are these standards working for me? What are the health risks? From my previous posts and knowing what I now know, I want a calmer life, I want a more balanced life. I am enjoying eating healthily and spending time with Ash, my doggy and my family. Over the past couple of weeks I can see that I have lost a bit of this balance and my 'rules' have started firing again, so it's time to ask, 'what is enough?' At the moment I honestly do not know, have I fallen into bad habits? Do I want constant acknowledgement for my hard efforts and if so, why?

All I know is at the moment whatever I have done or am doing is not working well for me and I need to make some more changes.. more changes on this ever interesting journey! It's a voyage of discovery and as always, I'm sure I will keep you posted with my findings!