Have some people achived perfection?

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Here's something that has really bothered me for over a year now. Many fellow students around school talk about their problems. Not getting homework done, a broken car, someone did something aggrivating to them, but a one person in particular seems to have it all. Tons of friends, a fun job, romance, a promising future, many other things that make me jealous. That's what they talk about (not to me directly) Every new person they face loves them. I don't think they know what a problem is. Everything comes up roses to them. What do you think? Have you ever seen or met someone who seems perfect? I don't think this person is the hardest working college student ever if they manage to keep so many friends. They seem to natually manufacture luck in their sweat. I just think you're a better human if you make your problems known.

Yup - I've known a few people like that over the years, one of whom is my sister. I resent the heck out of them, and cannot have any kind of relationship with them partly because of this resentment but also partly because we have no common ground for respect or friendship.

Got any ideas how to deal with them?

The thing is, you just can't know if life truly is perfect for these people. It may seem that way, but often that's because their social life and school environment and partner are their whole life support system.

For example, a girl in my class at school was sickeningly perfect... she was pretty, popular, and an amazing gymnast. She had scores of friends and every boy wanted to date her. Always talking about how happy and good her life was, and where she was going with it. It turned out, though, that her brother was dying from a degenerative muscle condition. She never told anyone because she didn't want sympathy or for her friends to treat her differently or treat her 'carefully'. She just wanted normality.

From this, I learned that outer happiness and seeming perfection doesn't always mean an inwardly happy or lucky person.

I'm drawn pretty strongly to people like that because I want to find out how they do it. How it works on an emotional and psychological level. And actually, when I was younger people considered me one of the perfect ones, because I had almost spotless grades and talent at art and music.

I was genuinely asked "Is there anything you can't do??" to which I would say "Gym." and they would reply, "So what? Gym doesn't matter." I could just as well have said "make friends"... the point is that all they saw was the conventional definition of perfect, without realizing that I didn't have some of the things they took for granted. Since they already had something (like social skills or whatever) their tendency was to devaluate it.

Once when I was 13 I had someone say "I wish I was you," to which I said "No you don't." They predictably asked me why, and when I couldn't explain, they got upset at me. I guess they thought I didn't value what I had, that because they saw some things coming easy to me, everything must be just as easy. The truth was that I had no idea where to find any friends, I had all kinds of undiagnosed sensory issues that I was tearing myself apart trying to hide, I was routinely teased, and I was terrified of various simple everyday things like starting a conversation. But if I had said something like "You don't want to be me because then you wouldn't know how to talk to people" they'd have looked at me totally baffled and scornful of whining and say, "What's the big deal? You just walk up to someone and say what's up?"

So I've figured out this much about the hazards of being "perfect": (some of these are examples from my life and some from others', so don't assume anything about me based on them)

Massive expectations of the people around you. Any slight mistake and people will jump all over you, "Ooh, look, he was 5 minutes late for school! Oooh, you're gonna get in trouble. Are you gonna get grounded?" because it feels like vindication to see a "perfect" person finally fail.

Loneliness and alienation (and this ain't just a spectrum thing, I've met popular NT's in far more pain from loneliness) because it doesn't feel like there's anyone you can relate to as an equal, everyone is trying to put you on a pedestal.

A sense of festering, not being able to apply your talents, because everyone is sick of seeing you do well, so further success only hurts them and drives them away. For example other students refusing to join a class contest because you are a part of it, or the other team in a game because they're sure they'll lose.

Interesting topic. I am truly perfect, so I don't have to worry about letting people down. But it's interesting to read about the people who are merely perceived as perfect. Thoughts?

Oh yeah.

I've seen people that come across as perfect. I know though, people aren't perfect.

I'm glad this topic got brought up, because in the past I've looked at certain people around me and thought that they really had everything together. But virtually every person I've gotten to know has like a "zero sum" in terms of personality traits. In other words, every positive trait is balanced out by a negative trait. One guy I know is extremely talkative and outgoing, and can easily make friends, but is completely clueless when it comes to romantic relationships. Another guy I graduated high school with was ranked second in our class and aspired to become a commercial airline pilot. But he also had trouble being responsible with alcohol, and the summer following graduation he crashed his car and was arrested for DUI, destroying his chance to ever be a pilot.

Or even consider public figures. Bill Clinton was an incredibly intelligent man who couldn't keep his penis under control and ended up hurting his legacy and public perception as a result. George W. Bush, by all accounts, is a very kind and compassionate man, but a terrible manager and administrator. The more someone gives the appearance of being perfect, the more likely it is that they have a very severe, fundamental flaw.

Perfect-seeming people are usually as*holes in my experience.

here's something I came up with through trying to deal with my own perfectionism:

Perfection is something you strive for asymptotically- no matter how close you get, you can never quite reach it. (but paradoxically its a worthy and laudable goal)

For you non-maths types, an asymptote is a line that a curve gets arbitrarily close to, but never reaches. By arbitrarily, I mean that no matter how small an increment you propose, the curve will get that close and closer to the line.

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Asymptote.html

Very few people perceive me as "perfect," so I've never felt the external push to be perfect. Occasionally, people think I've really "got it together" after short conversations with them because I don't worry about the same things that they do. A lot of people worry about getting straight A's; but, since I don't, some people think I'm so prepared and realized what's really important. What really bothers me is my complete lack of success with women; things I don't care much about or am confident I will do well in (academics is a good example of this), I have no need to worry about.

That person is kidding themself. I'd ignore them really cause they might be messing with you and making it up anyway. For them to brag makes it so that there might be some shallowness to them.