We all people-please. It’s part of our human nature to want to fit in and be accepted. It’s how many of us gain a sense of community.
However, excessive people-pleasing can lead to more harm than good. It silences your intuition, your needs, and your voice. It can be the underlying cause to a lot of anger and resentment in your life.
People-pleasing doesn’t create a safe space for you to exist, despite feeling like the safest option. In fact, it strips you of security by submitting your inner power to other people’s will.
It can be hard to tell when you’re in a people-pleasing trance, especially if it’s your default. These are several ways to tell if you’re doing what’s best for you or if you’re actually people-pleasing others.
1. You don’t say “no”.
Chronic excessive people-pleasers don’t have boundaries. They are focused on the other person’s needs so much that they don’t recognize their own needs. In fact, they may even live by statements like “I don’t have needs” or “I don’t need help”.
How often do you say “no”? Not “maybe”. Not “I’ll think about it”. Not “Let me get back to you”. But a hard “no”.
If you cringe at the thought of outright saying “no”, you may be in a people-pleasing trance. Focus on what areas of your life you’d like to set boundaries. Here’s a post to get you going.
2. You rarely speak up or offer a different opinion.
You are not the first one to speak up in a meeting, a classroom, or at the dinner table. You like to “read the room” first so you don’t get caught by surprise.
The thought of speaking out loud an opinion that is different than the majority, even if it’s most authentic to you, is terrifying.
You actively avoid conflict. If someone takes issue with what you’re saying, you immediately change your perspective to be more “acceptable”.
If you relate to this, check out this post.
Excessive people-pleasing can lead to more harm than good. It silences your intuition, your needs, and your voice. It can be the underlying cause to a lot of anger and resentment in your life. Click To Tweet3. You go for what’s most agreeable, even if it makes you uncomfortable.
You don’t believe your needs matter. Well, you don’t believe they matter as much as someone else’s. That is, if you recognize and accept that you have needs.
When something makes you uncomfortable, you default to believing that it’s because there’s something wrong with you and not that it’s something that goes against your nature and intuition.
You tend to suppress the desire to want something different than what you’re experiencing. You will deny yourself and your reality so you don’t feel the other person’s rejection and judgment.
I want you to know that we all experience levels of this. The first step is recognizing it in the moment and learning to sit with that discomfort, even if you don’t change your response initially.
When you learn to sit with discomfort and the feeling of being uncomfortable, you can begin to listen to your intuition and your inner voice.
4. You apologize often, even when it’s not your fault.
You apologize for things that aren’t your fault.
Why?
Because you’re apologizing for other people feeling their own emotions. It’s hard for you to fathom that their pain can come from a source other than you.
You tend to be hyper-responsible, which means you tend to take responsibility for situations and experiences that you are not directly involved in. This reality also means that people tend to project and blame you more. Instead of questioning their reasoning, you usually accept it to “keep the peace”.
Focus on your experience. One of your strengths is that you are a compassionate person that can see a situation from all angles. What is the situation from your angle? What are you feeling? What are you experiencing? What is truly your role and what is the role of the other people involved?
5. You ask for reassurance frequently.
You need to know if your actions and line of thinking is acceptable or “off the mark”. You don’t want to be wrong. Failure and rejection are the worst possible outcomes.
You fear people abandoning you and hating you. Your essence depends on people liking you and thinking the best of you. If they don’t, you believe it’s because you, as a person, are wrong and bad.
Universal popularity is not real, as much as we may wish it was. Not everyone is going to like you and that rarely has to do with you.
People are diverse and complex. You are diverse and complex.
Your people – the people who love you most in life – won’t ever need to be convinced of how lovable you are.
6. Your decision-making process depends on others’ opinions.
You like to poll people before you make a decision. You like to go for decisions and items that are trendy in the moment.
You don’t have a personal style that you stick with in the long-run. You like to know the “mood” of situations before committing one way or the other. You believe your life would be easier if others decided for you and you follow through from there.
Indecisiveness is a classic tell of people-pleasers. Fear of decision and commitment rests in the desire to be liked and accepted.
Spend time getting to know what styles, senses of humor, and viewpoints you gravitate towards. What gets you excited? What brings you joy? What bores you? Listen to these pieces of yourself and discover ways to integrate them into your everyday life.
7. You don’t give straight answers just in case you’re “wrong”.
Many times, people think you’re asking a question when you’re actually trying to make a statement. In reality, you are. The question is “Is what I just said acceptable and likable to you?”
You beat around the bush, so to speak. What you really want in the moment is to extract the “right” answer from the other person because you fear being shut down and shut out.
The real question needs to be “Is what I just said acceptable and likable to me?” At the end of the day, you are the only one who is living your life. It needs to be good for you.
People-pleasing doesn't create a safe space for you to exist, despite feeling like the safest option. In fact, it strips you of security by submitting your inner power to other people's will. Click To Tweet8. You change your attitude or behavior to fit in.
You behave differently in front of different friends or family members. This is normal to a degree. However, if you find yourself being an entirely different person in likes, interest, and personality, an alarm bell goes off.
You believe the best way to avoid confrontation and conflict is to mimic the mood of the room, even if it’s the opposite of how you feel and your desires in the moment.
You find yourself agreeing to commitments that you don’t want to engage in. You may even find yourself not speaking much. In fact, your friends probably know little about your personal life and your family probably knows little about your outside life.
Practice speaking your needs. You can start gently with phrases such as “I need space right now. Let me get back to you” or “I want to say ‘yes’, but I need to say ‘no’.” or “I think that’s a good move for you. I don’t want to participate. How can I support you in another way?”
9. You will pretend to agree with something or someone because you fear rejection.
The most painful thing you can experience is the hatred of somebody else because it confirms your inner narrative that you are unlovable and worthy of hate.
So, to ensure a (false) sense of security, you try to be as agreeable as possible so no one can fault you for being unlikeable. You establish this by being a “yes man”, or saying “yes” frequently, especially when you wish you could say “no”.
This is an incredibly painful thing to experience. It’s nice to think that it’s in the other person’s control. “If they only wanted what you wanted” mentality.
However, the ball is in your court. Your happiness and joy depends on your ability to love yourself. When you have love for yourself, love from others flows easily to you because you recognize that you are worthy and deserving of real, authentic love.
Learn how to get started on your self-love journey here!
