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I was raised to expect perfection from myself. If I brought home an A-, my father would ignore the As, and be upset with me for the A-. If I brought home straight As, he would ask why none of them were an A+. He was trying to bring out my natural abilities, and I understand that. I didn't even think it was unreasonable. I was sent to small Catholic schools that had higher standards of education than the norm, but I still didn't find the coursework very challenging. I don't think I ever studied for a test until college. Perfection seemed attainable, and attainable by me. I learned to expect nothing less from myself.

My family practiced a very strict, very controlling form of hard-line, old-school Catholicism. If you know the rules taught by hard-line, old-school Catholicism, it will mean more to you to hear that I did not break those rules, especially the rules related to sex. I took the rules extremely seriously; after all, nothing less than my immortal soul was at stake.

I was taught that if others lusted after me, it was probably my fault for wearing revealing clothing, adorning myself, or otherwise giving in to the sin of vanity. And of course we all know from the Bible that merely lusting after someone is the same as actually breaking a Commandment with him or her. Making me guilty of mortal sins in the minds of others, sins that could actually be sending them to Hell for all eternity.

Probably a bit overstated, but to an extremely dramatic, emotional 14-year old girl who is very confused about sexuality, these fears were real.

My upbringing instilled in me the tendency to examine myself for flaws, and then to try to root them out. For a long time, the part of this that had the most power in my life was the self-examination and the zeroing in on my flaws. I am intimately familiar with the contents of my mind, heart, and soul, and the exact ways in which they fail to measure up to some arbitrary standard of perfection.

At the same time, however, I was very good at what I did, and my INTJ tendencies led me to really believe that in actuality, I am quite competent in certain areas.

How to reconcile a deep sense of Never Being Good Enough with a somewhat arrogant sense of Being a Total Bad-Ass?

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I compartmentalized the people who were judging me into several categories. To most people, I was a confident, masterful, poised, and self-assured young person with an authoritative and (probably) correct answer for pretty much everything -- or at least, that's how I thought others viewed me. (I could be completely wrong, of course, and probably am.)

But perversely, it was precisely those people whose opinion held zero value for me. I literally did not care if 10,000 people all thought I was amazing and raved about me. Their opinions were meaningless, because of the mental category in which I had placed them.

Next as a judge, there is me myself. Always, in the background of almost everything I do, I am judging myself. I constantly decide whether my efforts were good enough, monitor the outcome(s), and adjust future performance to contribute towards my goals. I do this pretty much all the time, or at least I did 10 or 15 years ago. (Less so now, thank goodness.)

But although I did certainly expect perfection from myself, there was a deep core in me that also contained sanity, love, forgiveness, and compassion for my own flaws. After all, I knew how hard I was trying, and I knew how competent I was. If I, with all my gifts and all my force of will and sheer effort, could not be perfect, then no one could be, and I knew that, even 10 or 15 years ago when I was mired in this insanity. And even back then, deep inside myself, I forgave myself for not being perfect. It's that core that has kept from from sliding down into a very bad place of self-hatred for my flaws.

So the first category didn't matter, and the second category (myself), although a harsh and exacting judge, was not completely insane. I was OK.

But the third category! The third category consisted of certain special, chosen friends who would see more of the inner me. To them, I would reveal more of my doubts and fears and weaknesses.

My greatest terror was that after I showed my weaknesses to someone in this third category, I would end up getting rejected.

I am blessed with many friends who know my flaws, and who like -- or even love -- me anyway. I have said stupid, rude, mean things to them, taken advantage of them, ignored them at times and then smothered them at others, demanded things of them, and burst out into annoying Bon Jovi songs right in front of them, and they still like me anyway. (You know who you are!)

But of course, eventually and inevitably, my fears of rejection did come to pass. As I look back, it seems that in a few cases I actively sought out people to become part of this third category, almost knowing beforehand that they would end up rejecting me. It's almost as though I set up a situation in which my worst fear would be realized.

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What lesson was I trying to learn here?

As I examine it now, it seems to me that the lesson could be that my mental categories of people are, to be crude, bollocks (or another equivalent "b" word).

If 10,000 people think I'm swell, well, maybe I actually am fairly swell. Even if only 10 people think I'm swell, or only 1, maybe I actually am. If, deep down in my core, I think I'm wonderful and I love myself, well, maybe I really am wonderful and worthy of love.

Maybe this artificial division of people into categories is as dismissive of them as it is damaging to me.

Maybe my self-worth does not depend on what other people think of me, no matter what "category" I put them in.