Navigating Love Without Losing Yourself: The People-Pleasing Dilemma
Last week I had such a lovely time at the Leeds Yoga and Wellbeing Festival. It was such an honour to be asked to speak and I’m so grateful to everyone who joined me to deep dive into People Pleasing!
It’s a topic I return to frequently as breaking down my own people pleasing tendencies created such a huge, positive shift in my own wellbeing, my relationship with myself, and my relationships with others. If I can share a bit of what I’ve learnt in the hope it can help others too… that makes my little heart very happy.
During our Q&A, and throughout the afternoon, I was asked about how to navigate challenges in relationships caused by people pleasing partners, friends, and loved ones. I was so glad to be asked about this as not only does people pleasing make life hard for the people pleaser, but it makes life hard for those around them. And, for those of us who are on the road to overcoming our people pleasing habits, it’s hard to stand by and watch someone entrenched in theirs.
This week I’d love to talk about this a little more. Let’s explore how to support the people pleasers in our lives, and work through the challenges people pleasing tendencies can present in our relationships.
My experience:
When I was in the thick of my people pleasing habits I believed I was contributing positively to every relationship because I was totally committed to making my friends, partner, and family happy. They always got to do what they wanted, and they came first. However, I was unhappy, worried, constantly anxious as I am wondering if everyone else was content and happy. What I didn’t realise was that by doing this I was laying the foundations for a pretty unhappy, maybe even toxic relationship in which no one could relax.
My behaviours that were causing the biggest issues were:
Never wanting to make a decision
Being incapable of making a decision
Feeling terrified to communicate my true feelings
Never considering what I wanted to do
I genuinely believed this was contributing to making everyone else happy. I needed to keep the peace, I feared making the wrong decision, I feared conflict, and through that was completely detached to my own wants and needs.
Your experience:
Throughout the week I’ve been asking you about you experiences with your people pleasing loved ones. You told me…
So many of your conversations revolve around worry about someone else.
You have to do all the thinking and decision making.
You don’t know if they’re agreeing because they want to keep the peace and/or please you, or if that’s what they actually want.
You thought they were happy, and it turned out they weren’t.
This can all be frustrating, tiring, and can leave us feeling like we need to be mind-readers.
How do we navigate these challenges?
Understand why
Their habits and behaviours are based in fear, learnt from past experience. Whether this stems from their parents, past relationships, or trauma, people pleasing is a learnt behaviour that they believe is necessary in order to survive. Understanding this can help to dissipate the frustration the behaviour can bring.
Help them feel safe
Being a safe environment in which they can express themselves without fear of retaliation is key to them feeling they are able to share their true feelings, wants and needs. They fear a negative response and conflict. If your loved one can begin to learn that their thoughts and feelings won’t be met with disdain, or that disagreeing doesn’t equal an argument and rejection.
Encourage decision making
Firstly, communicating that you understand why they’re leaving the decision to you, and communicating why it’s important to you for them to decide is key. If like me they’re at the point where they struggle to make decisions, give them 2 or 3 options to choose from. When they learn there isn’t a ‘wrong’ choice, they will then begin to break down the fear of expressing their needs and slowly rebuild their ability to communicate their opinions.
Support them in standing in their truth
The people who love them will support them, anyone elses opinion does not need to be considered, and certainly not worried about. When they are able to distance themselves from worry of others opinions, they are able to embrace their own wants and needs without fear. Something I find really effective in helping a people pleaser learn this is to flip their perspective and ask… “If I were worrying about XYZ’s opinion… what would you say to me?”.
Encourage self-care
Whatever this looks like for them, it will allow an opportunity to start prioritising and reconnecting to themselves.
Don’t take advantage of their people pleasing nature
I think this goes without saying but it’s easy to ask the person who’ll definitely say yes to step in and help.
It's essential to strike a balance between being considerate of your loved ones needs and taking care of your own well-being. Healthy relationships require open communication, mutual respect, and a shared commitment to each other's happiness. Understanding the cause of people pleasing behaviours, and working together in taking steps to overcome this with compassion and care takes patience, but it can be done, and it will be worth it.
To chat more about this click here.