To stop being a people pleaser

[RoadtoPetition]

I think I’m a bit of a people pleaser. It’s lessened as I’ve got older and stopped giving as much of a f*, but definitely still a tendency.

I was wondering if anyone else was the same and had actively stopped, and what happened?

I still think I have a slight fear that I’ll lose friendships and connections, although if I do, were they worth having in the first place? Hence me asking for other experiences of this.

My DH is a people pleaser. The only trouble is that it tends to be in overdrive with strangers or people he barely knows and much less with his own family. I struggle to understand it in all honesty. Surely the people you want to please are those closest to you. He can’t seem to say no even when people are clearly taking the piss. It’s not an attractive trait and it’s led to arguments between us.

@nouht agree with what you've said wholeheartedly. It took several years of therapy for me to start being able to address this. I was literally beaten into submission as a child. There were no options at all. I did as I was told or I would be hit and we are not talking a small smack, we are talking wooden spoons, sticks, ropes or whatever else might be in the vicinity. I tried to anticipate my mother's every need before it even occurred because I thought this would save me the beatings. It is very difficult to unlearn that kind of conditioning. I genuinely feel a frisson of fear if I think someone is displeased with me because deep down I think they are about to hit me, even when my rational mind knows that this is unlikely to be the case.

There are distinctions in this thread where some people are observing "faux agreeable" behaviour used to manipulate their partners or friends. This is a different thing to people pleasing in the sense of a trauma fawn response, but I can see how it is easy to see it as the same thing. The "faux agreeable" people are the ones then bitching about what they've had to do or moaning about it to others or going back on their word. Fawn responders won't even contemplate moaning because they think that they should actually be doing this stuff for other people. Pleasing has become an intrinsic part of their identity. It doesn't occur to them that 'no' is an option and they don't see themselves as martyrs, they just think that this is the way life is and that this is what they should be doing.