Perfectionism is the real villain in the movie 'Happiest Season'
And we’re back!
Hopefully by now, you’ve either seen or been convinced to watch this movie. So glad I could add yet another subscription service to your monthly bills!! Mazel Tov!
Did you also see bits of pieces of your parents, or parents you know, in the Caldwells? While watching the movie they drove me bananas and yet I can totally relate to all of the daughters’ desire to please their parents. No matter how flawed or seemingly perfect our parents are, I believe there is a little part in all of us who can relate to wanting to please our parents.
And it’s ironic isn’t it, that inside of these big beautiful, seemingly idyllic homes (Tipper Caldwell, that leopard wallpaper in the bathroom is a very nice touch!!!) there’s actually a great deal of secrecy and pretending. It’s sometimes easier to say that our parents were great and wonderful and perfect than having to engage with the all the shit that’s gotten swept under the carpet.
Because I definitely believe you that your parents are great, because look at you, you’re great! I just don’t believe you when you say you have perfect parents.
While Tipper and Tom Caldwell want you to think they are perfect and delight in admiration from afar, they don’t want you getting too close to see any cracks in the facade. Sound familiar, anyone?
My therapist’s eye caught: Perfectionism
Why it’s dangerous: Perfectionism is a breeding ground for secrecy and hiding.
What we can takeaway: The more we create a safe place to tell the truth about our own imperfections, the safer folks will feel in relationship with us.
Tipper and Ted Caldwell show us the dark side of wealth and success. To me, it’s that there is a cost to everything…especially the cost of appearing perfectly put together.
The evolution of perfectionism.
We know this quandary has only become more apparent with the rise of social media. As the millennials we are, we know what it was like before the onslaught of social media. We took our disposable cameras down to the nearest drug store and had that shit developed. What you got was what you got! The only editing tools we had were scissors and sharpies, glitter glue if you were fancy. We had big, clunky macs that came in the teals and oranges, but let’s be honest, most of us had beige bricks for a computer with the world’s loudest keyboards. The rich kids, aka the Caldwell girl’s had Mac’s as evidence by the OG’s still on the girls’ desks in their childhood bedrooms. Also, can we note how perfectly accurate it was that Tipper only used her iPad to take pictures, nary an iPhone in those manicured hands of hers!
Back to those childhood bedrooms. It was fascinating to see how they left the trophies and pictures from high school untouched and shrine-like in their bedroom. I can see Tipper going in one of her girls’ rooms from time to time, thinking back fondly to the good ol days. And by good ol days, I mean the days when she was running the show and the girls’ lives looked exactly how she wanted them to look. They were playing sports, they were succeeding academically, they had cute boyfriends. The girls, say for Jane, were falling in line with exactly who the parents needed them to be. Except we have some clues from Riley, that the very opposite was going on right under their noses.
As the Caldwell’s showed us, perfectionism is a breeding ground for hiding and secrecy.
Honestly, it was Papa Caldwell that infuriated me the most in this whole movie. It’s easy to focus our attention on the women’s behavior i.e. Harper’s gaslighting and Tipper’s extreme micromanaging. But in a way, all of that attention on the women protects the incredulous behavior of Pops and allows him to skate on by, almost unnoticeable.
While I don’t doubt he is a man that loves his family, he is also a dangerous man that is fueled by toxic masculinity, perfectionism, favoritism, and exploiting his girls’ accolades to continue climbing his shame based ladder of more, more, more. We see this as he calls his favorite daughter Harper to accompany him to meet potential donors and leaves his other two daughters standing there like dried up seaweed on the beach. Most of the dialogue he has with his daughter Jane is not actually dialogue. He just talks at her to go and fix the router or the internet or the printer. It’s all very gross.
I also think about how Harper outed Riley as gay in high school and flipped the story to make Riley the bad one, so Harper could stay all good in her parents eyes, but more specifically in her father’s eyes. While Harper does need to deal with the very real harm she caused, I think about how she comes by this kind of behavior really honestly. She learned how to hide and manipulate from her Father as it was a home that valued appearances more than integrity.
And when the family secrets explode and litter the family room after the White Christmas showdown, we see how each of these daughters has had to learn and perfect the art of withholding their true selves and keeping all of the mess hidden.
It seems to me that Tipper is at least open to her daughter’s feedback. Yes, she’s a control freak and a helicopter parent (i.e. don’t invite an old boyfriend to the family dinner, BOUNDARIES MOM!!…)The real sticking point in my opinion is the Papa Ted. As we see, he removes himself from the messes, uninterested in getting tangled up in his family's feelings and locks himself away in his office.
Dad doesn’t like the mess. Dad likes perfection. And when things aren’t perfect, Dad goes away. To keep Dad around, things have to stay neat and perfect.
It is looking at the darker parts of each of our parent’s humanity that is often some of the most uncomfortable work we do in therapy. It’s also some of the most essential work we do in therapy because if we refuse to name and explore how our parents have hurt us, there will be no moving on, and we will have trouble moving away from our approval-seeking behaviors. Our growth will be stunted because we want to protect our parents and keep them on a pedestal so we do not have to contend with grief, anger, and sadness over the ways our parents have harmed us.
What we can takeaway: The more honest we are about our humanness, the safer folks will feel in relationship to us.
It’s so ironic, isn’t it? That perfectionism seeks to keep everyone safe and happy with us, but in actuality it’s a breeding ground of anxiety, shame, and secrecy. In fact, studies have shown that perfectionism is associated with depression, disordered eating, anxiety, negative relationships, and hopelessness.
The ending scene of the family together, laughing, happy and at ease is so hopeful because it’s the first time in the whole movie the family is actually together, meaning their defenses are down, there’s been a collective exhale, they can all finally be. Getting to that place doesn’t happen overnight unfortunately. Damn these 90 minute movies that fuel our impatience with the process!
The ways the our parents engage with the world and keep themselves safe will likely be the same ways that we too engage with the world and keep ourselves safe. I think about how Harper came by her defenses of hiding, withholding, looking perfect, and having everything appear neat and tidy, really honestly. Most of the time, she’s probably not even aware that she’s trying to tidy up her life to make it more presentable because it feels so normal. In fact, it would actually feel more abnormal to her to not try to make things perfect. Wild, but true.
Even though she had this good and beautiful revelation and finally came out and their whole family had this tender, heartfelt reconciliation, those tendencies towards hiding and people-pleasing don’t go away overnight. In fact, I imagine when the time comes for her and Abby to have kids, should they decide to, those same tendencies are going to be passed onto her kids. Does that mean that she won’t love them and care for them deeply? Absolutely not. But does it mean that Harper could benefit from some long-term psychotherapy to heal and find some different options than just hiding and people-pleasing so she can learn how to communicate and care for herself and her emotions so she doesn’t harm her kids like she was harmed? Absolutely!
Take a moment to think about your parents once being your age and all the things you’re dealing with or avoiding dealing with.
It’s safe to say we’re all well-aware that we have some things to work on ourselves. That’s why we can all loosen up a little bit, the pressure’s off to be perfect. And, you think these parts of your story that you’ve struggled with for decades suddenly go away when you become a parent?! I know you’re an intelligent person and you can correctly deduce becoming a parent doesn’t mean your life is neat and tidy and figured out. And lots of you are parents already and you know this to be true. Love you moms!
For full transparency, my husband and I haven’t ventured into the parenting world quite yet, but you better believe we will have a t-h-r-i-v-i-n-g therapy fund available to them for when they decide it’s time to process how we’ve messed them up. I say this with all love and sassiness, this is just how things work, you can’t not screw your kids up- BUT maybe you can learn from your parents mistakes and do a little bit better for your kids and then maybe your kids will learn from your mistakes and humanness and do a little bit better for their kids and ever so slowly we get better and better over time. The goal here is to be in the work, not to arrive at an unrealistic, non existent place of perfection.
Have I mentioned yet why therapy is important? I’ll take this as a shameless plug that if you’re in Texas and in need of some wholehearted, kick-you-in-the-butt therapy, holler at me!
Now Mrs. Caldwell might remind you of some parts of your Mom. Or if you’re a Mom you might see parts of yourself in her. Same with Mr. Caldwell, although I’m still mad at him and think he has a lot of repair work to do both with his daughters and his wife…But the reality is I don’t think anyone in the movie is all bad. No one in this movie is all good, Jane and John come in close, but still! When you live from a place of striving and keeping appearances up, bad things inevitably happen and harm is caused. The kindest thing you can do is to be the type of person who is willing to look at your own stories and confront your own shadows so that you can be open and willing to hear from those around you how you’ve hurt them and to then work towards repairing the relationship into a more real and honest one.
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To all the parents who are navigating being a parent of adult children, who have the insight to know you weren’t a perfect parent, I hope you also know you were a good enough parent. I mean, look at your kids! They are kind and sensitive and caring! They are decent, semi-responsible members of society! You helped cultivate those things in them! You are a good Mom. Please let those words digest because it’s the truth!
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This lady’s got to scoot and get ready to see clients. The attire for writing and seeing clients are quite different and the latter requires a shower and washing of the hair. So annoying. What’s not annoying is I’ll be back in a few days to talk all things Abby! Gosh, what a gem! Can’t wait!
Until next time!
BB