A book can help with
For the child who won’t start unless they’re certain they’ll be good at it.
Perfectionism in a child rarely looks like high standards. It usually looks like avoidance: not trying the new sport, not entering the competition, not starting the drawing at all. Underneath is a quiet fear that being bad at something says something permanent about them.
Books loosen this by showing characters who are wonderfully, cheerfully rubbish at things and carry on regardless. That’s a more persuasive argument than reassurance, because a child can see it happening rather than simply being told not to worry.
Here’s what I’d reach for. Find your child’s age and start there, and the page on mistakes has more on the same theme.
Having a go
At this age it’s about being willing to start, and finding that being new at something is fine.
Vashti is certain she can’t draw, until her teacher dares her simply to make a mark, and that one dot grows into a whole exhibition. It’s a beautiful little parable about starting before you feel ready. The gentlest possible answer to ‘I can’t do it’.
or on Bookshop.org
Jabari is determined to build a flying machine, and it fails, and fails again, and his frustration is beautifully drawn before he works out that asking for help and trying again is part of it. Persistence made concrete. Warm, and honest about how annoying failing is.
or on Bookshop.org
Being a beginner
Older children can grasp the bigger point: that everyone is bad at things before they’re good at them.
Beatrice has never put a foot wrong and the strain of maintaining that is enormous, until she slips publicly and finds the relief on the other side. It shows perfectionism as a cage rather than an achievement. The clearest book on the subject for this age.
or on Bookshop.org
A cheerful, convincing case that nobody is born brilliant and that being rubbish at first is simply how everyone gets good. For a child paralysed by wanting to be immediately excellent, it reframes the whole business. Genuinely motivating and widely loved.
or on Bookshop.org
Getting it wrong on purpose
At this age perfectionism tends to look like not trying, because not trying is safer than failing where everybody can see. What follows makes the mistake the interesting part.
Forty things that only exist because somebody got it wrong: Post-it notes, crisps, penicillin, the ice cream cone. Short entries with cartoons, so it is a dip-in book rather than a sit-down one. It is hard to keep believing a mistake is a catastrophe while reading it.
or on Bookshop.org
Ally has hidden the fact that she cannot read by being the class troublemaker, because being the bad one is less frightening than being the stupid one. Then a teacher notices. What lands hardest is how much effort the hiding was taking.
or on Bookshop.org
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Something to do together
A page for trying one thing you’re not good at this week, and noticing what happened rather than how well it went. I’m making it now, and it will live here soon.
A perfectionist child narrows their own world, quietly, by only doing what they already do well. The aim isn’t lower standards, it’s making it safe to be a beginner.
So praise the trying rather than the result, let them watch you be hopeless at something and enjoy it anyway, and go easy on the word ‘clever’. A child who can tolerate being bad at things will try far more of them.
For you, the grown-up
There’s a companion page for grown-ups over on the main Book Quote Therapy library, with books for adults who need everything just right.
Read the grown-up version →These pages are written for the grown-ups looking after a child: parents, teachers and carers. A good book can sit beside a worried child, though it never stands in for a real conversation, or for proper support when something feels too big to carry alone.