Why our obsession with self-improvement is holding us back from healing trauma

Every time I grab my phone for some escapist scrolling, which is more often than I care to admit, I’m bombarded with advice for how to ‘level up’ my life. These pervasive 20-second clips are so generic and formulaic, yet they somehow suck me in.

We all know that social media is a highlight reel where people without expertise share unhelpful advice or use their platform to regurgitate sweeping statements about personal and nuanced issues like mental health, nutrition or relationships.

However, constant exposure to these types of messages can gradually erode our experiential wisdom about what is right for us, in favour of chasing a perfectionist ideal curated online by influencers.

Science suggests that the rise of social media and its short-form video content is changing our brains. We have shorter attention spans and poorer executive functioning. As someone with a strong personal and academic interest in psychology, and a degree in health sciences that has taught me the importance of media analysis and critical thinking, I’m far from immune.

There is a lot of good to be done by normalising topics like self-doubt and mental health, and sharing our goals and journeys for accountability and inspiration. I also credit social media with making mental health support more accessible for those whose ‘real life’ social circles may be less open or supportive.

But I worry that the cost of widespread ‘healing’ advice about various topics has come at the expense of reputable and trustworthy information. I fear that the simplistic, glamourised version of the perfect ‘healing era’ we see online has become just another reason to believe we are never doing enough. I see this bleeding out into the real world, and how my friends and I talk about ourselves both online and offline.

Boundaries or barriers? Balancing self-protection with connection and community

When we expect perfection from ourselves, we also risk holding unrealistic expectations of our loved ones. I’ve seen friendships self-implode because of resentments over simple miscommunications, and have lost people I love due to mutual stubbornness and avoidance of constructive confrontation.

Why are we now so quick to label, dismiss, and diagnose people who ever trigger negative emotions? In a world where we can maintain the illusion of an endless supply of friends or lovers online, it’s easy to see why some people treat relationships as disposable or replaceable.

After all, why would we have a difficult conversation with a person we feel wronged by, when we can label them as a narcissist or toxic and move on to the next shiny new object? People often talk of the naivety of the honeymoon phase in romantic relationships, but it applies to friendships too.

The human brain loves novelty, which can put us on our best behaviour when we are getting to know someone new. We show up, we show interest, we’re fun, spontaneous and engaged. Even if we notice little red flags, they are easier to ignore when we’re excited about a potential new friend or partner.

Once the excitement wears off, the cracks can start to appear. We let our guard down, experience conflict, and may have interactions that trigger insecurity, envy, frustration or other difficult emotions. Rather than investigate why we are reacting to something our friend or loved one has said, we sometimes dismiss the entire human being or relationship to avoid facing whatever it is they have triggered deep within us.

Of course, there are instances when a person is genuinely dangerous or unhealthy for us, and breaking up with family or friends can indeed be the safest and healthiest thing to do. Yet, even the rhetoric about making clear, firm boundaries is rife with perfectionism, ignoring the complex nuances of relationship dynamics that may make us hesitate to completely cut off contact once and for all.

You always have the right to decide who you allow access to your life and energy. But there is a difference between someone who makes a mistake or rubs you the wrong way in a moment of tension, and someone who is toxic at their core and needs to be avoided at all costs.

Expecting ourselves and those around us to be perfectly regulated and healed as a prerequisite to connection is not only unrealistic, it’s keeping many of us isolated, lonely, and without the support we need to continue on our healing journeys.

Is healing from trauma a form of self-improvement? 

Given the commodification of self-optimisation, it’s no surprise that our spiritual and emotional wellbeing gets confused as just another part of our lives to perfect and optimise. While healing can be a way to improve our quality of life, it’s not as simple as ‘fixing’ our problems.

Morgan Pommells, a therapist and coach, explained how our society’s obsession with self-improvement has confused and trapped many of us in our journeys. Clinging to unrealistic expectations of what it means to heal can create a vicious cycle of trying to ‘cure’ our painful pasts. We imagine that once we arrive at a place of being healed, we will be completely free of triggers or pain. But healing is not an absence of something – it’s not an obliteration of the parts of us who have suffered.

I’ve wasted years of my life wishing for a different past. I believed if I could erase certain traumatic experiences, I wouldn’t struggle with insecurities, an anxious and overactive mind, sleep problems, or relationship wounds.

In reality, I can never know if this is true. What I do know is that attempts to ‘fix’ myself by rejecting these parts of myself only led me down a shame spiral of self-rejection and the inability to offer myself compassion and acceptance.

I sat in therapists’ offices, feeling frustrated and stuck. I already knew the reasons for most of my struggles. I had spent countless hours analysing my behavioural patterns and tracing them back to their origins. I could recognise the early signs of feeling triggered, and yet, I still struggled with episodes of depression and anxiety.

“I know why I am the way I am,” I would tell my new therapist. “I just want to be better already.” Reflecting now, I was waiting for someone to tell me how to cut out the parts of myself I didn’t like, so that I could finally be worthy of enjoying my life and having meaningful relationships.

I was exhausted, but I felt like I needed external permission to stop chasing an elusively perfect version of myself and just be. I became frustrated when advised to accept challenging parts of myself and my history; I wanted the secret method to erase them.

But I have finally learned that self-acceptance doesn’t mean we can never want to improve anything about ourselves. Quite the opposite – accepting where we are at now without judgement is the only realistic way to start forging a path to where we want to go. 

Self-compassion: The missing link to combatting perfectionism and finding peace

Why do we cancel seeing our friends when we don’t feel ‘our best ’? What happened to the deep intimacy of letting those close to us see us at our messiest and most beautifully flawed? How can we tell the difference between cocooning ourselves out of a genuine need for true rest and simply hiding away until we feel worthy of engaging in our lives in a way that won’t inspire judgement from ourselves or others?

When did the expectation that we should be perfect and that our friendships should never cause us inconvenience or discomfort replace the ability to accept what is true in the here and now, even if we ultimately wish for better for ourselves? Self-compassion and acceptance have almost become taboo concepts, euphemisms for laziness or giving up, especially in a world with ‘seize the day’ tropes emblazoned into our social media feeds, home decor, and daily interactions with those around us.

But self-compassion doesn’t mean we love everything we feel, think, or do – it simply means showing up for ourselves as kindly as possible. Without this skill, our efforts to improve our lives, heal from trauma, and achieve our goals will always be restricted by limiting self-beliefs about which parts of ourselves deserve to be seen, known, and loved.