It isn't an oversimplification to say that perfectionism, at its core, is about a deep and irrational need for emotional and often even physical security. As much as I dislike searches for abstract "root causes," because causes tend to be complex, we can safely (no pun intended) conceive of the specific goals and specific desires in perfectionism as being in service of self-preservation, feeling protected from external and, thus, internal skeptics and critics.
Now, in this final part (transformation), we follow Claire further: how her need for control - once an adaptive defence - turns into a closed system of fear, and how healing begins not by surrendering control, but by understanding what it has been protecting all along. Compensatory Narcissism and Mnemonic Anger Claire's discipline is often mistaken for pride, but it is, in fact, compensatory narcissism-not vanity, but a defence against humiliation, a defensive self-idealisation that repairs a wounded sense of worth.