Atelophobia

The word means fear of imperfection — not the healthy wish to do well, but the paralysis of a person who would rather not begin than begin imperfectly.

Watch the logic. The perfectionist believes he has high standards. In truth he has a single standard — flawless — and it behaves like a locked door. Since no first draft, first business, or first attempt survives that standard, nothing passes through the door. The result is the one outcome he feared: nothing is produced at all.

Nature does not work this way. No tree waits until it can grow perfectly. It grows crooked, corrects, and grows again. Every expert you admire was once a beginner whose work embarrassed them — they simply survived the embarrassment.

The cure is a lowered first bar, set deliberately: write the bad page, cook the plain meal, make the clumsy call. Done imperfectly beats imagined perfectly, every single time.