To think you can’t spare people’s feelings?

[CryJustALittleBit]

I’ve been a people pleaser all my life and grew up in an abusive house where guilt and faux ‘responsibility towards others’ emotions’ was used as a manipulation tool.

I’ve learned to say no as I’ve gone through life but not without great emotional cost - had a serious breakdown at 22 after which I learned I HAD to start saying no.

But when I reflect on all this I realise that we can’t necessarily spare other people’s feelings no matter how tactful/respectful we are, whenever we reject people socially others tend to know ‘the bottom line.’

For instance, when I finished with my partner, I said we met too young and grew apart. He knew though that I thought he just wasn’t good enough.

I was also tactful about ending a friendship with a longstanding friend - even though I used words like ‘busy’ - she knew that I just didn’t think she was a good enough social option any more - she’d been unpopular in school

He knew though that I thought he just wasn’t good enough.

she knew that I just didn’t think she was a good enough social option any more

Did he and she tell you that they knew?

BTW, I hope you are good enough for any future partner and friendship circle.

My ex did - directly

My friend - no - but I could tell she thought so from her obviously disappointed reaction

as for your last sentence - I suppose I deserved that..

I think I understand. Do you mean even though you don't spell the reason out the other person knows it's an excuse?
If so, then yes, you can't help it if they are upset. What's the alternative? Deliberately hurting their feelings?

Yes exactly that - even if you don’t outright say the reason people know

Ah I do get this to some extent.
I've also been a serial people pleaser, and recently started setting more boundaries and trying to think would this person do the same for me? And if not, I've decided not to put myself out, and only agreed to do things that work for me.
As a result I'm now the "difficult one" making it hard to get together, and nobody can make any plans work because nobody else wants to compromise now that I'm not the one bending over backwards 😂

It doesn’t sound very tactful to keep saying you’re busy and effectively ghosting her. If you were concerned about her feelings, much better to just say you don’t want to be friends anymore. She was probably eventually relieved, as it sounds like you weren’t a good enough social option for her.

There's a middle option, isn't there?
Not actually lying, but you can try to let people down gently.

I think people tend to massively overestimate how tactful they are being.

You've literally said you thought both the boyfriend and your friend weren't good enough for you any more. At risk of being a bit direct myself, maybe people who think in more shades of grey are more successful at letting people down gently.

Agreed - but that is not without risk

I think ultimately however tactful you are, a rejection is a rejection. The stated reason for ending a relationship or a friendship will only ever be a bit of public relations. People aren’t stupid and they know.

I think if it’s a really embedded relationship people are owed the decency of an honest explanation. If you have fallen out with someone telling them you don’t have time to see them is dishonest and will come back to bite you if they try to find time.

But I think tact has its place too. Nothing is forever, sometimes you need to move on but if someone has been important to you they deserve respect.

Thinking people aren't good enough for you, so much so that they know it, then cutting them out of your life for that reason is dick behaviour and nothing to do with you being a recovering "people pleaser" (mn excuse du jour)

There is a difference between letting people walk all over you and being a dick. Find that line and tread it, and you're golden

What does sparing someone’s feelings really mean?

Every human on the planet has experienced sadness, hurt, confusion, boredom, anger. These are normal human emotions and not ones to be avoided because you can’t. It’s healthy to experience and get through the full range of emotions from time to time. The world can’t be positive all the time.

What do you think happens when someone is hurt and upset? Most of us feel down for a period of time then dust ourselves off and move on.

Of course it hurts when someone ends a relationship. But just because you perceived your ex and your friend as ‘not good enough’ doesn’t make that a fact. That’s just how you felt about them but to someone else they me be the best partner/friend. And vice versa.

Agree with everything here - particularly first paragraph

Perfectly put.

@Brefugee

But the brutal truth of the matter is that if you have fallen out of love with someone or no longer want to be their friend there’s not much you can do about it.

You can’t say it’s dick behaviour and maybe it is but there’s only so much you can do if your heart is no longer in a relationship. You can commit to being honest and decent when you cut ties with someone or not badmouth them after you have parted ways.

But it’s not realistic or reasonable to expect to keep a friendship or a relationship on life support indefinitely just to not be a dick. After a while something will have to give. The pressure of maintaining something you don’t believe in will be intolerable to both parties.

Human relationships should be built on decent behaviour but fundamentally they are pretty instinctive and you can’t force them is they are not there.

So on the money that it bears quoting again.

OP, you sound the opposite of a people pleaser, frankly.

It’s not really this simple. Sometimes it’s important to tell the truth. Sometimes it’s an option. Sometimes it’s cruel.

I would encourage you to unpack this with a therapist. If you’ve experienced trauma you can be prone to all or nothing thinking and it’s important to find the grey among other things.

Recovering from people pleasing is about becoming more able to make decisions in the moment and to have good boundaries. That isn’t easy to do alone.

The only people I’ve ever known who overtly considered themselves to be ‘people pleasers’, were considered ‘narcissistic weirdos with seriously low self awareness’ by others.

@usernamesaretoohardtothinkof

It’s not really this simple. Sometimes it’s important to tell the truth. Sometimes it’s an option. Sometimes it’s cruel.

Absolutely this. It’s about learning when it’s appropriate to be honest and when it’s not.

Ultimately people (unless they are very lacking in self awareness) know the real reason whether you are honest or not: they bottom line is that they are dumped.

Sometimes honesty and directness is essential but sometimes it’s just gratuitous.

I’m hoping that your use of “good enough” is just a short-cut to avoid lengthy more nuanced explanations about what wasn’t working in the relationships.

Otherwise, it comes across as highly arrogant and judgemental I’m afraid.

I'm sorry about your abusive childhood, but I think you may still have some work to do if you now think people aren't good enough for you.
A reasonable thought process around your ex partner and friend would be that he wasn't a good fit for you and you didn't have enough in common with her. The way you frame it says more about you than about them.

So true

"she knew that I just didn’t think she was a good enough social option any more - she’d been unpopular in school"

If you dump friends because they were unpopular at school, I wouldn't say you were a people pleaser, more of a total asshole...

I'm sorry you suffered abuse as a child, no-one should go through that, but your two examples I would say are cases where you should try to protect other people's feelings because your feelings are kinda harsh and unhelpful... and what good will come out of telling your BF or a friend that you don't think they're good enough for you? Being honest is more important where there's something they can (possibly should) change. So saying you're not up for meeting up anymore because a person is really flakey gives them a chance to change their behaviour for example.

Also, there is a difference between people pleasing and being kind.

People pleasing = doing / saying things because your self-worth rests on what other people think about you and whether you are any use to them.

Being kind = just wanting to make the other person’s day better / save them from hurt, because you genuinely care about them.

People pleasing is self-serving when you think about it, as it’s a form of self-preservation and a reaction to toxic relationships. You are beaten down to a point where your only was to survive is to please others.

It’s understandable that you might think that the opposite of people pleasing is just not caring about the feelings of others. But it isn’t really. Kindness is a genuine impulse inside us to save others from hurt. It can be difficult to distinguish from the self-preservation instinct of people pleasing. But worth taking some time to think about it and to learn the difference.

Agree with this. It sounds like you’re a bit confused. You’ve gone from one extreme to another and the pendulum needs to swing to the centre.

Framing other people as ‘not good enough for me’ is an unusual way to view people, especially friends, and gives the impression of entitlement and superiority.

I’d go back and do more reading, at the least, but you would probably benefit from working with a therapist on this. Your current thinking and conceptualisation of yourself and others seems no more healthy and functional than it was previously.