Advice column urges self‑compassion over moral perfectionism for people with scrupulosity

An advice column in Vox counseled readers who worry compulsively about being morally perfect to trade an ethic of optimization for a more attainable goal: living in line with their values as best they can. The column framed the issue as common among people who experience scrupulosity — persistent, anxiety‑driven doubts about whether they have done the right thing — and said the drive to do “The Most Possible Good™” can lead to paralysis rather than helpful action.

The column, part of Vox’s "Your Mileage May Vary" series, responded to a reader who said the Jewish High Holidays, and Yom Kippur in particular, trigger obsessive review of past behavior and debilitating guilt. The reader described spending hours replaying memories to search for moral failings and said that guilt had stopped being motivating and become an obstacle to living according to their values.

The columnist recommended a different conceptual framework drawn from value pluralism — the idea that individuals hold multiple valid values that sometimes conflict and cannot always be reduced to a single metric for comparison. That contrasts with maximizing moral theories, such as utilitarianism, which seek the single action that produces the greatest overall good. The column argued that humans are neither omniscient nor capable of reliably computing such optimizations, and that attempting to do so often consumes mental resources needed for effective action.

To illustrate the point, the column invoked a rabbinic story about the gift of scripture to humans rather than to angels. In the tale, angels objected to giving the Bible to fallible humans, saying the text was suited to the perfect moral capacity of angels. Moses countered by noting that angels lack the human conditions that moral rules address — emotions, parental relationships and work — and that the point of scripture is to help humans become better at being human, not to turn them into angels. The column used the story to argue that moral life is necessarily messy and that rules alone cannot capture the full complexity of human ethical decisions.

The columnist urged readers to replace a perfectionist, optimizing aim with a humbler objective: try to live in accordance with one’s values, and when actions fall short, apply self‑compassion rather than harsh self‑condemnation. The piece noted a Hebrew term commonly translated as "to sin" — lachto — literally means "to miss the mark," an image the columnist said can normalize small failures and encourage a compassionate response.

The column also cited empirical findings from psychology suggesting that self‑compassion does not produce moral complacency. On the contrary, people who practice self‑compassion are often more willing to acknowledge mistakes, apologize and make amends, the piece said, because errors feel less existentially damning and therefore easier to address constructively.

To readers who feared that gentler self‑treatment would reduce their efforts to do good, the column offered a practical instruction: take reasonable pains to act in line with values, but once a choice is made, accept human limits. If an action later proves suboptimal, respond with repair and learning rather than prolonged guilt or self‑punishment.

The column recommended resources for developing self‑compassion, including The Mindful Self‑Compassion Workbook by psychologists Kristin Neff and Chris Germer and an eight‑week course offered by the Center for Mindful Self‑Compassion. It also noted a recent essay in Aeon by philosopher Elad Uzan arguing that artificial intelligence is unlikely to resolve ethical complexity, drawing on parallels with Gödel’s incompleteness theorems to suggest moral questions will always contain elements that resist algorithmic solutions.

Jewish tradition and the column’s interpretation of rabbinic texts were central to the response to the reader’s question about Yom Kippur. The column highlighted a rabbinic view of the holiday as a celebratory moment: after Moses shattered the first set of tablets, the second set was described as a human‑divine collaboration, reflecting an acceptance of interpretive and moral complexity rather than a demand for flawless adherence to a fixed rulebook. That framing, the column said, supports the practice of repentance and repair without catastrophic self‑condemnation.

Mental‑health professionals and religious leaders who address scrupulosity typically recommend approaches that balance moral concern with strategies to limit compulsive checking and rumination, including cognitive‑behavioral therapy and, where appropriate, medication. The Vox column’s advice aligns with those clinical approaches by encouraging a shift from punitive self‑judgment to targeted action and learning.

Readers seeking help for chronic scrupulosity are advised to consult mental‑health professionals who can offer tailored treatments. The column presented self‑compassion as a practical supplement rather than a replacement for therapy or religious practice, and it encouraged those troubled by intense moral doubt to pursue professional support while using compassion‑based methods to reduce paralysis and promote constructive amends.

The piece closed by reminding readers that moral life is inherently complex and that holding multiple, sometimes incommensurable values is a human condition. For people whose conscientiousness becomes a source of distress, the column recommended aiming arrows as true as possible, then accepting human limits and focusing on repair and learning when the mark is missed.