Most of my clients who access therapy for people pleasing don’t seek me out for that reason. They usually reach out due to work stress, anxiety or problems in their relationships. When we delve deeper, we often identify that a fear of letting others down and a lack of boundaries is the cause. They have a lightbulb moment when they realise they’re chronic people pleasers and we work on understanding where these patterns came from and how to stop.
People pleasing is a widely experienced, but often misunderstood, cause of mental health problems and can be hard to overcome without knowing how. This blog will explain all about people pleasing including causes, signs, how to overcome it and what to expect from therapy.
- What is people pleasing and why is it a problem?
- What are the signs of people pleasing
- How childhood experiences cause people pleasing
- How to stop people pleasing
- What to expect from therapy for people pleasing
What is people pleasing and why is it a problem?
People pleasing means fearing disapproval and needing to “please” others to feel “okay”. It can show up as not being able to say no, prioritising other people’s needs above your own and caring a lot about what people think.
People pleasing affects personal and professional relationships including with family members, friends, partners but also colleagues at work.
It may seem harmless as pleasers are often viewed as kind, hard working and always there for others. But in fact, persistent people pleasing is responsible for a wide range of mental health problems such as anxiety, stress and relationship difficulties. This is because people pleasers become overwhelmed with commitments and are therefore at high risk of stress. You also ignore your physical and emotional needs so don’t to look after yourself. You may experience symptoms of anxiety because you overthink situations and assume the worst about other people’s reactons.
It can also lead to broken relationships because pleasers often feel they cannot be themselves, avoid conflict and struggle to express themselves which builds up resentment.
What are the signs of people pleasing
There are a wide variety of ways that you can people please and some are more obvious than others. Below is a list of common people pleasing patterns but if you want to read more depth about different types of people pleasers, click here.
Not saying no or having boundaries
This is the most common example when we think of people pleasing behaviour. For example, someone asks a favour which is really inconvenient but instead of politely declining, you agree. Or you’re asked to attend a social commitment which you really don’t want to go to but go along due to fear of letting someone down or disapproval. Saying yes to everything means people pleasers get overwhelmed and experience more stress than others.
Not knowing own needs, wants or desires
If you’ve spent all your life fitting in with people around you, you will likely have stopped listening to yourself. So if someone asks for help, you automatically say yes before tuning into how you feel. Or you may find it easy to agree with others because you don’t feel you know who you are and what you think.
Prioritising other peoples needs and experiencing excessive guilt
People pleasers often find themselves in caring roles and take on alot of responsibily for the needs of people around them. So at home, doing more than your fair share of domestic duties or running extra errands for friends or family that need some help. Although helping loved ones in need is obviously a good quality, people pleasers do this at their own expense and feel guilty when they don’t.
Avoiding conflict
People pleasers tend to avoid conflict because they associate conflict with disapproval and therefore rejection. This is terrifying for people pleasers because keeping everyone happy ensures they feel liked and therefore “safe”. This chronic need for approval prevents people pleasers from disagreeing, in case it leads to conflict, or they will not tell a person how they feel, even if they have upset them.
Caring what people think and worrying people are mad at you
Constantly scanning for the reactions of others and worrying that people are mad at you is a subtle sign of people pleasing. So if a friend has not replied to a text or seems off, you may automatically assume its because of something you have done. This is because your emotional system is dependent on keeping others happy. Your mind will try to protect you by overthinking how you come across and assuming the worst about what other people think, making you feel anxious.
Adapting your taste and interests to people around you for approval
Another subtle sign of people pleasing is adapting yourself to suit those around you. So you might keep opinions to yourself, pretend to like something that you don’t or even base decisions on what would gain the most approval. Sometimes you may not even realise you are doing this because you’re so used to caring what people think. So you might automatically like something that other people do, without reflecting on whether this is your taste or theirs. This tends to occur because a person has spent so long adapting themselves to other people, they have lost connection to their own wants and desires.
How childhood experiences cause people pleasing
Its not possible to be born a people pleaser. Its a pattern you learn through childhood experiences and early relationships. For example, certain types of parenting creates low self worth which increases fear of rejection. But other childhood experiences are also factors, such as having to look after parents with health problems or modelling their behaviour. Its important to note that parenting is hard and most parents do not get everything right. But if the childhood experiences below are persistant and excessive, it will have an impact later in life.
How critical parents with high standards can cause people pleasing
Children are wired to want to please their parents because, from a survival point of view, we may not survive if they rejected us. But if parents high standards and are critical when a child doesn’t meet them, it sends the message that their love is conditional and results in an adult that pleases others to feel “good enough”.
Being a "parentified" child and worrying about their parents.
Adults that grow up to be people pleasers were often children who needed to look after, or worry about, their parents. For example, if a parent experienced severe poor physical health, a child may have needed to take on extra caring responsibilities. But also, if a parent seems mentally unwell, unhappy or alone a child may worry excessively about them. So they tune into the emotions of their parents rather than themselves. A dynamic which creates adults who feel overly responsible for the emotions of others and experience excessive guilt if they cannot help them.
Emotionally unavailable or absent parents
Part of developing a healthy sense of self worth is knowing that your needs and emotions are important. Some parents don’t actively criticise their children but might not provide the emotional support that they need. This means a child finds it hard to tune into their own emotions or think they aren’t important, which feeds people pleasing. On the other hand a parent that is totally absent, due to divorce or death, can cause a fear of abandonment which a person may please in order to avoid.
Shaming parents that struggled to regulate their own emotions
Being a parent can be stressful and its not uncommon to shout at your kids. But if a child is regularly exposed to an angry, shaming environment, they may track the emotions of parents and adapt their behaviour to feel safe. Or they live in a volatile household with lots of shouting between family members so become the peacekeepers, staying small and well behaved to make people happy. If this happened to you, it makes sense as an adult you will often assume other people are mad at you and feel anxious unless you please them.
Learning from parents who themselves are people pleasing
Even if your parents were very attentive and accepting, if they were people pleasers themselves this can shape your behaviour. So for example, if you always saw your mother self-sacrificing, never resting and saying yes to everyone, this will seem like normal behaviour.
How to stop people pleasing
Although it takes time, people pleasing patterns can be undone. Sometimes it’s possible to do this on your own or you may wish to access help from a therapist. Here are some steps to start the journey yourself and below I explain what to expect if you are considering therapy for people pleasing
Learn how to challenge your thoughts
Almost universally, people pleasers will jump to conclusions about other people. Ie. they will assume someone will judge them or reject them if they don’t say yes. Being able to spot the thought that is causing the anxiety and weigh up evidence is a really useful skill. Most people don’t even realise they are jumping to conclusions and sometimes it can be helpful just to pause and ask yourself “Is this a fact or a feeling”?
Cultivate mindful self compassion to tolerate uncomfortable thoughts & feelings
The body doesn’t know the difference between a thought and a fact. For example, thoughts such as “that person will be mad at me if I say no” create strong reactions in the body. These feelings are so uncomfortable that a person will please in order to get rid of them.
But instead of trying to fight these thoughts and feelings, mindful self compassion helps you to be curious and more accepting of them. This may sound counter-intuitive, but it helps you to tolerate uncomfortable feelings, so that we can have more choice in how you respond to situations. To read more about how mindful self-compassion can help you to stop people pleasing, read here.
Practice makes perfect - test out healthy boundaries
It may feel scary, but sometimes the only way to truly know if someone will reject you for saying no is to test it. Prioritising your needs, even in small ways, can help you to learn that it’s safe to have boundaries. The more you do this, the safer you will feel and the less likely you will be to people-please. Learning the skills described above, to help tolerate new uncomfortable feelings and challenge thoughts, will obviously help when testing out new boundaries
Improve self worth so that you care less what people think
Ultimately, the most effective step to stop people pleasing is to improve self worth. This is easier said than done, but if you continue to never feel good enough you will always please others. Try to understand why you don’t feel good enough and practice tools to increase self love. You can read more about how to increase self worth here.
After reading the blog and learning about the different tools available, you might be considering working with a therapist to overcome people pleasing. Although all therapists differ in their approach, specialist therapy for people pleasing is likely to involve the following evidence-based tools:
- Explore your past to identify the source of people pleasing patterns such as discussing your relationship with parents or other significant events
- Use the therapeutic relationship to help you become more aware of your emotions and safe to express them
- Help you to identify the thoughts that lead to unhelpful behaviour and support you to generate different perspectives
- Set homework to test out new boundaries so that your behaviour changes gradually
- Teach you skills, such as mindfulness and self compassion, to increase tolerance of uncomfortable feelings that arise when you first stop people pleasing.
- Process traumatic events that might have led to low self worth, such as abuse or neglect.
Want to work with me?
I’m a fully qualified therapist and mindfulness coach specialising in people pleasing, low self worth and anxiety.
If you’re interested in working with me to feel calmer and more confident click below for a FREE 30 min consultation.
