The Psychology of your 20s - 26. People pleasing - how to say NO!

Episode Date: March 23, 2022

This week we discuss people pleasing: what it is, where it comes from and some interesting links to trauma and gender. We also discuss some strategies for learning how to say no and putting yourself first!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. 2%. That's the number of people who take the stairs when there is also an escalator available. I'm Michael Easter. And on my podcast, 2%. I break down the science of mental toughness, fitness, and building resilience in our strange modern world.

Put yourself through some hardships, and you will come out on the other side a happier, more fulfilled, healthier person. Listen to 2%. That's TWO. percent on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the Look Back at it podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84 was big to me.

I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it. With our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. 84 was a wild year. It was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for black people.

Listen to look back at it on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, what's good, y'all? You're listening to Learn the Hard Way with your favorite therapist and host Kear Games. This space is about black men's experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere, but you're having them with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing. How many men carry a suit or armor. It signals to the world that you not to be played with. And just because you have the capability that doesn't. does not mean that you need to.

Listen and learn the hard way on the AHA radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hello and welcome back to the psychology of your 20s, the podcast where we talk through some of the big life changes and transitions of our 20s and what they mean for our psychology. Hello and welcome back to the podcast to the show. Hope you've been amazing and you're feeling loved and motivated inspired by your. your life at the moment. I'm feeling great. But if not, well, maybe this episode can explain just an aspect of why that may not be the case. I'm guessing if you're listening to this, if you clicked on this,

then this topic probably resonates for you in many ways. So let's not waste any more valuable time. I have a lot to discuss today, but I don't want to make another 50 minute episode like I did a couple weeks ago. I've realized recently, sorry, here I go rambling, not even a minute in, but I realize that listening to one of my episodes normally takes the same amount of time for me as it does to get to my local beach between 22 to 13 minutes. Hence why I'm trying to keep them more bite-sized. How sweet. Yes, I do listen to my own podcast in the car and yes, it's strictly for professional purposes and reasons because I don't always listen over them. when I press publish because I am lazy.

So I have to do my due diligence later on. Anyhow. Today we're talking about people pleasing, what it is, how to break the cycle, the trouble it gets us into, and why are you kind of getting in your own way by refusing to say no? This episode was inspired by many conversations with one of my bestest of friends, Aaron, and one of my most loyal listeners. Oh my gosh, I miss her so much. but shout out if you're listening, which you probably are.

I'll see you soon. But we chat about this a lot because I think it's a behavioral pattern we both fall into quite frequently. And it came up recently because she was up in Sydney for my birthday. And while she was here, I was talking about how I was like almost anxious because if I didn't enjoy myself, even if I didn't enjoy myself, sorry, I wanted everyone else to be having a really good time. I wanted them to be happy.

And she said, Gemma, that's people pleasing to a tea. And here we are doing an episode on it. Strap in and get ready to learn. The idea of people pleasing has had a pretty steady rise in pop culture and psychology. Pop culture, I guess, these last few years. I think probably due to the increasingly individual nature, the trend or kind of perspective of psychology in its applications to our lives and the focus on self-growth and self-awareness. And the idea is also quite a recent one, the idea of People Pleas. obviously the behaviour has been around for a while we just haven't always um i guess

had a name for it but there have even been like poems written about it so one is pretty dramatic i found it when i was researching this episode and i thought it was quite funny wait let me read a line where is it i always say yes can never say no swallow or hurt let no feeling show he insulted me badly called me the son of a bore i just rolled over saying kick me, kick me more. Some very dramatic lines from that poet, Alan, Bruce Thompson. Thank you, thank you for your inspiring, if not depressing lyric, Alan. But I don't know why I said that, but I think it's just interesting. I don't know why I felt the need to cite this poem that I had in my research, but I think it's just an indicator of how long this behaviour has kind of been

part of a dialogue around our interactions with other people. And people pleasing has become Such a popular term though that it has, wait for it, its own webmd page. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you know the site you go to check if your headache may be, I don't know, cancer, well that site can now diagnose you with people pleasing. It's also inspired numerous psychology books such as the disease to please and when it's never about you. Titles that are almost as dramatic as our friend Alan's poem, but you get the gist. People pleasing is now a pretty common. popular part of daily psychobabble. So what is people pleasing? Yes, it does kind of say it all

in the name, but let's dig a little deeper as we tend to do in this podcast. Essentially, people pleases are those who cannot maintain clear boundaries with others and do really whatever it takes essentially to make other people happy. They're often highly attuned to others and seen as agreeable, helpful, really kind. However, people pleases may have trouble advocating for themselves, which can lead to a pretty harmful pattern of self-sacrifice and self-neglect. I think whilst it's generally seen as a positive attribute to want to help others and act pro-socialally and in a way that kind of aligns with this entrenched altruistic norm, when we begin to see ourselves as second to the needs of others, you will inevitably end up

depleted and anxious. And you also tend to experience disconnect with yourself and become unable to recognize or express what you need from a situation or from others in your lives. Like I've kind of said already, a key element of people pleasing is that it generally goes beyond simple kindness. It involves, you know, editing or altering words and behaviors for the sake of another person's feelings or reactions. And that was explained by Erica Myers. And she's a therapist in the US at the University of Oregon. This is what else she kind of had to say. You might go out of your way to do things for the people in your life based on what you assume, what you assume they want or need and you give up your time and energy to get them to like you, to get them to love you more.

And Myers says that this is how people, people, people, blah blah, people pleasing. It's a bit of a tongue twister. How people pleasing can cause trouble. The urge to please others can be. damaging to ourselves and potentially to our relationships when we allow other people's wants to have more importance than our own needs and when we try to anticipate what others want from us without trusting that they can advocate for themselves. It's a pretty well-known rule of thumb that relationships they should be equal, give and take. I think that's the, I think the previous overview of people pleasing. It shouldn't be taken to mean that you can never offer a distance for others, because you might be placing your second. No, it's all about balance, baby.

What I find really interesting with people pleasing behaviours is how our brain literally hijacks itself to not only be better at recognising other people's needs over our own, but happy to do things for others at our own expense. It's so counterintuitive and counter to kind of an evolutionary idea of survival. So here are some pretty typical indicators of being a people pleaser, not just someone who's happy to help a friend, a partner, or, you know, a neighbor out, but a full-blown people plays up. So you have a difficult time saying no. You're preoccupied with what others might think of you, which we're going to talk about a lot

later on. You feel guilty when you have to tell people no. You fear that turning people down will make them think that you are selfish. You agree to things that you don't like or do things that you don't want to do. This is really common with some of my friends, you know, they sign up for things or they offer to help a friend out and they just really need, you know, some alone time. It's not what they need to go and socialize more. You might struggle with feelings of low self-esteem. You want people to like you and you feel that doing things for them will in some ways earn their approval. You're always

telling people sorry and you're taking blame for things even when it isn't your fault. And think about what kind of life that would entail if you're constantly apologizing for things, always in the guilt trap our brains have created or being so preoccupy. occupied with what others think that you can't really ever seem to consider yourself. And it's no surprise that psychologists and researchers have found heaps of known links between people pleasing and disorders like social anxiety, OCD and depression. So where does this type of behavior come from? I want to jump into some very interesting links later on, mainly around trauma and gender.

But before then, let's talk about some of the more typical causes of. of people pleasing behavior. So firstly, and we've talked about this in some of the indicators, but poor self-esteem. So sometimes people engage in people pleasing behavior because they don't value their own desires and needs. Perhaps due to a lack of self-confidence, people pleasers have a need for external validation

and they may feel that doing things for others will lead to approval and acceptance. People pleasing behavior is not always an expression of goodwill. It comes from a longing to feel socially secure, and it's a symptom of a generalized fear of abandonment, which usually comes from the relationships we have with our parents or our caregivers, and a general sense of self-esteem. So this other idea in psychology called self-efficacy. So self-esteem and self-efficacy.

Self-efficacy, it refers to an individual's belief in their capacity to execute behaviors necessary to produce specific performance attainments. So basically, it kind of reflects your confidence in your ability to exert control over your own motivations, your social environment, and the health of your relationship. So what's really interesting about self-efficacy is that researchers haven't yet been able to determine the direction of that relationship. So whether low or high self-efficacy contributes to people-pleasing tendencies more. So on one hand, if you feel, feel like you do have a lot of control over the quality of your relationships, you may be more likely to engage in people pleasing behaviours because that's one of your tactics for control.

But in contrast, feeling like you don't have a lot of control may lead you to overcompensate and try to constantly help others. If anyone has the answers to that conundrum, the link between self-efficacy and people-pleasing behaviours, please let the psychological community know. They'd be very interested. perfectionism is another huge, huge determining factor of people-pleasing. We've talked about this many times before on the podcast. It comes up all the time. But sometimes people want everything to be just so,

including how other people think and feel about them. Helping others, prioritizing them, makes you seem more likable and keeps those people in your life. And this gives the perception of a perfect social circle and I guess a perfect lie. And people pleading and perfectionism, they both come from the ego. So for those who aren't so familiar with this Freudian idea of the ego, which is different from our normal conception of the ego as like the arrogant part of ourselves,

let me explain. So according to Freudian theory, there are three core elements of the human psyche. The id, the ego and the super ego. So the ego is who we are in the present. It's the reality created by the behaviors that we express. And the super ego and the id, they're kind of like the devil and the angel on your shoulder. The super ego represents pure morality and what society would expect us to do. And the super ego is part of the unconscious mind or the psyche that is kind of the voice of conscience and doing what is right.

And there's also the source of self-criticism. In contrast, this is sneaky. little id is the primitive, instinctive component of your personality. It's where intrusive thoughts come from. It contains like our urges, our impulses, and it's where Freud argues, our immediate reactions are born. So then we arrive at the ego, and the ego is the part of your mind that cares about what others think. And it is kind of involved in that balancing act between our pure morals that have been conditioned into us by society and then what we really want to do. And it's what the ego is what we are aware of when we think about ourselves and it's what we

usually try to project towards others. So this is where people pleasing behaviors come from. It comes from the part of our brain or our mind that recognizes that we can be perceived by others and wants people to like what they see because of that. because of that recognition of perception, we strive to make others happy. And when our ego doesn't strike the balance or the correct balance between the super ego and the id, the side of us that makes it hard to say no and seeks excessive validation, obsessively from others, obsessively from others, yes, that's the part that kind of rores its head. And like I said, perfectionism, it's a pretty core aspect linked to people pleasing. But there is another aspect that's

super common amongst those of us who are more concerned with making others happy. And it's called sociotrophy. Socio-trophy is the tendency to place an inordinate value on our relationships over personal independence. So it's in direct contrast to, I guess, excessive independence or autonomy, which is a concern with personal achievement and control over your daily life rather than what other people think of you. So people with this trait, socio-trophy, tend to have strong needs for social acceptance, which is what causes them to be overly nurturant towards people who they may not even have a close relationship with

or people they might not even like. And we can really see from kind of a very basic viewpoint why a personality trait such as this would make you more predisposed to people pleasing and that constant kind of agreeableness for the sake of others. whilst not specifically linked to people pleasing but something interesting nonetheless is understanding this character trait so people with sociotrophy they also tend to react really differently than those low on this trait in situations that involve self-control so in one experiment

they had people who were rated high on the trait of sociotrophy share a meal with another person who was actually an actor and this actor was instructed to either over-eat, under-eat or not eat at all. Sociotropic individuals in this experiment, they consume more food or they try and match appears eating habits when they believe that doing so will make that person, the actor, feel more comfortable. And this is often hypothesized as being the result of the individual attempting to achieve social approval and avoid social rejection. The social pressure and dependence can cause a loss of self-control in an individual, especially if they are unaware of their desire for social acceptance. Now, crucially, sociotrophy has been correlated with feminine or female sex role orientations

in many research experiments again and again. And naturally, the prevalence of people-pleasing behaviours show a similar correlation. So people-pleasing is more commonly presented in women over men, which I think we could probably have assumed. One recent study found this behaviour to be exhibited in the majority of female participants, 59%, whilst only a minority of men, I think around 38%, showed similar tendencies. As a result, women are suffering from greater adverse effects on both their mental and physical health from these behaviours. The pressure that women feel to be people-pleases is very very,

real and it comes from a lot of historical norms around female behaviour and their role in society. Women are conditioned really early to be caregivers and more generous with their time and energy because of their, you know, expectant future role as mothers. Even if you don't have children, you see how other women in society act and the amount of sacrifices they're asked to make compared to their male counterparts. And a lot of these sacrifices and, are tied to people pleasing behaviours. This is entirely anecdotal, but a lot of my female friends, they struggle saying no. They struggle establishing boundaries at work with partners and their friends, never having free

time because they always have things to do with or for other people. And I'm not saying it's a purely gendered thing, but the research doesn't lie. You know, it's a man's world. Women are just holding it up without people pleasing behaviors. people pleasing behaviors as we've kind of mentioned they often lead to people taking advantage of you which is why our 20s are such a formative year for setting those boundaries and putting ourselves first some people are really good specifically sociopaths and narcissists they're really good at recognizing and taking advantage of people who display people pleasing tendencies they may not be

able to name their behavior but they do know that you'll agree to whatever they ask, so they'll keep on asking and you keep saying yes because you want to keep them happy. And this can put you at higher risk of, you know, manipulation or mental or emotional abuse, even financial problems if people ask you for, you know, monetary assistance. We've talked about this a bit as well, but it can also be a real challenge to establishing healthy long-term relationships. Healthy, strong, especially romantic relationships, they're balanced and they involve, give and take. you do nice things for your loved ones and they do the same for you.

You probably won't have very fulfilling romantic relationships when you feel like people will only like you if you do nice, excessive things for them. Affection, it's not a commodity. When all you do is give to others to present yourself as the person you think they want, you're not showing up in the relationship as yourself. And it's difficult to maintain, much less feel satisfied with when you aren't actually present in your relationship. Also, I'm super, super sorry if you've had to learn this the hard way, but giving everything to other people, especially a partner or someone you love thinking it will

make them love you, doing things for them, going out of your way to constantly serve them, teaching them things, buying them things, letting them walk all over you will never convince them to love you more. And I know that can be where some of these people pleasing behaviors in romantic relationships can come from because you think that if you think that if you're you give more and sacrifice more for their happiness, you'll become someone they can't live without. They'll turn around, they'll recognize how amazing you are. And it's just never going to be the case. I've learnt this time and time again.

It never changes. Either they don't recognize it or they just assume that you like doing it, I guess. None of this is looking particularly pretty, I know. So how do we change it and get out of our own way with these people-pleasing tendencies? Firstly, show kindness when you mean it. It's perfectly fine and even a really good thing for your mental health to practice kindness. But kindness, it doesn't come from a desire to earn approval and it generally doesn't involve any motive beyond wanting to make things better for someone else.

Before you offer, you know, words of affirmation or help, consider your intentions and how that act will make you feel. Does the opportunity to help someone else bring you joy or do you think it's going to make you resentful or you're going to feel? appreciated. Practice putting yourself first. You need energy and emotional resources to help others. And if you don't take care of yourself, you won't be able or capable of doing anything for anyone else in the future. Putting your needs first isn't selfish. It's actually quite healthy. You know, it's okay to be a giving caring person, but it's also important to honor and tend to our

own needs. Keep in mind that needs can involve things like offering your opinion in a work meeting, getting comfortable with your emotions and feelings and asking for what you need in your relationship, that can sometimes do more good than bad, speaking up for yourself and not just more good for yourself, but more good for those around you if they know where you stand. We've said it again and again, but learn to set boundaries. So according to this psychologist, Myers, developing healthy boundaries is a pretty important step, not just in overcoming people-pleasing behaviors, but for setting up any kind of healthy long-term relationship. The next time someone asks for help or you're tempted to intervene,

consider three things. How do you feel about the action? Is it something you want to do or are you dreading it? You can always just say no, you can always back out. You don't owe your time or your energy to anyone but yourself. Think about whether you have time to cede your own needs first. Will you have to sacrifice your own time or a necessary chore? or something you're looking forward to to helping this other person.

And how will helping make you feel? Will it make you feel happy or will it make you feel resentful? Finally, wait until you are asked for help. No matter what the problem is, you know, if you're a people pleaser, you're always ready with a solution. You volunteer for things of work. You jump in with suggestions when a friend, you know, mentions any kind of problem offer to help them out.

Next time, challenge yourself to wait until someone explicitly asks you for help. If your partner, I don't know, goes off on a rant about how awful their boss is or how shitty one of their friends is, show how much you care by listening instead of, you know, listing off tips to deal with the situation or offering to do something that they might not even need you to do. They may want empathy and just validation more than anything else and probably involves a lot less from you financially, personally, in terms of your time and a lot of other limited resources. I hope you enjoyed this more bite-sized episode. I'm trying to get into the habit of kind of varying how long the episodes are, like shorter, longer. That's literally what I just said. But you get my gist just so that there's a bit of variety

and you don't have to sit back and listen to some 50-minute ramble about things you might not even care about. Get to the point, Gemma, I understand. Next week we're going to talk about love languages. I have been discussing this with my friends for years. And I kind of started to think whether they're valid, whether they're actually a reliable tool for assessing what you need in a relationship. We're doing a lot of relationship-based podcasts at the moment. I also just realized that recently as well.

I don't know. I'm just really into the social psychology at the moment. It's just really quite tantalizing and very interesting. Hence why you're seeing a lot more of those people-focused episodes on your feed. If you don't like it, that's okay. More of the positivism and more of the biological psychology is coming back soon. But this is a podcast about your 20s and the relationships we form in our 20s are, I think, probably one of the most important aspects. Also, I say this every episode, but if you have made it this far, please, if you feel inclined, if you have a few extra five seconds, really, five seconds, 10 seconds, leave the podcast.

review on either Spotify or Apple podcasts. But if you don't want to do it, if you think that that's going to reinforce any people-pleasing tendencies, don't do it. You know, set those boundaries. You don't owe me anything. But it would be very nice.

And thank you for listening. Thanks for supporting the podcast as always. Drop a line on the website or on Instagram if you have any ideas that you really want me to kind of look into. I love doing the research kind of more than I like recording in the episodes at the moment. I've got all of these like amazing papers saved in my browser that I'm just trying to get through

to make these kind of as evidence based as they have typically been. So yeah, if there's anything else you want to add to that pile, please feel free to do so and have an amazing weekend wherever you are in the world and thank you for listening. 2%. That's the number of people who take the stairs when there is also an escalator available. I'm Michael Easter. I'm on my podcast 2%. I break down the signs of mental toughness, fitness, and building resilience in our strange modern world. Put yourself through some hardships, and you will come out on the other side a happier, more fulfilled, healthier person. Listen to 2%.

That's TWA percent on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. On the Look Back at it podcast. From 1979, that was a big moment for me. 84's big to me. I'm Sam J. And I'm Alex English. Each episode, we pick a year, unpack what went down, and try to make sense of how we survived it,

with our friends, fellow comedians, and favorite authors. Like Mark Lamont Hill on the 80s. Before it was a wild year. It was a wild year. I don't think there's a more important year for black people. Listen to look back at it on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, what's good, y'all?

You're listening to Learn the Hard Way with your favorite therapist and host Kier Games. This space is about black men's. experiences, having honest conversations that it's really not safe to have anywhere, but you're having them with a licensed professional who knows what he's doing. How many men carry a suit are armored. It signals to the world that you're not to be played with. And just because you have the capability that does not mean that you need to, listen to learn the hard way on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an iHeart podcast.