Setting boundaries helps overcome people-pleasing because it teaches others to respect their limits. This reduces the likelihood of being taken advantage of. Imagine someone who always says yes to extra work even when overloaded, promising to help with projects that aren’t even required. This can lead to burn out. After realizing the negative effects of the extra workload, recovery can look like setting limits on their workload and politely declining tasks when necessary, giving them a better work/life balance.
In today’s society, the tendency to prioritize others’ needs and expectations over one’s own can lead to significant emotional and psychological challenges. In this series, we would like to explore the complex dynamics of people-pleasing behavior and its impact on individual well-being and relationships. We would like to discuss the root causes of people-pleasing behavior, its effects on personal and professional life, and practical steps for cultivating healthier relationships and self-esteem. We hope that this series can provide insights, strategies, and real-life experiences that can help individuals navigate and overcome the pitfalls of being a people pleaser. As part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Paige Bond, MA, LMFT.
Paige Bond is the founder of Couples Counseling of Central Florida where she goes beyond traditional talk therapy methods to provide Psychedelic and Accelerated Resolution Therapy for deep relational healing. Paige also hosts the Stubborn Love podcast and created the Jealousy to Joy Journey. Her mission is to help people-pleasing millennials navigate non-monogamy so they can tame their jealousy and love with ease. Her own journey from feeling lonely, insecure, and jealous to feeling empowered and reassured is what fuels her passion to help other people-pleasers to conquer jealousy and embrace love.
Thank you so much for your time! I know that you are a very busy person. Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us your “Origin Story”? Can you tell us the story of how you grew up?
Thanks so much for letting me share! I grew up in the “ideal” scenario from the outside. Mom and dad worked hard raising me and my older brother. Going into my pre-teen years, my mother’s struggle with addiction after her father’s passing grew to a point that tore my parents’ marriage apart. Eventually they divorced and I lived with my brother and dad full-time going into my teens, with a burning desire to figure out what makes people stay together since the model of what a marriage was blew up before my eyes.
Can you tell us a bit about what you do professionally, and what brought you to this specific career path?
I’m a licensed marriage therapist providing relational counseling in my private practice as well as relationship coaching for people-pleasers navigating non-monogamy. My parents’ divorce sparked my intrigue of wanting to get involved in the helping field. After realizing I was not cut out for the world of medicine or research, I landed in a graduate program for marriage, couple, and family therapy to provide more of a talking space for healing.
Once I launched my private practice, I noticed a high need for sex-positive consensual non-monogamy affirming therapists in my area. I started my coaching business for people-pleasers out of my own experience of constant insecurity while trying to navigate non-monogamy with a past partner at the time.
Thank you for all that. Let’s now turn to the main focus of our discussion about People Pleasing. To make sure that we are all on the same page, let’s begin with a simple definition. What does “People Pleaser” mean to you?
Someone who is people pleasing means they change who they are or what they do to make other people happy, even if it’s something they don’t want to do. They sacrifice their needs and their comfort to keep everything and everyone around them at bay.
On the surface, it seems like being a person who wants to please others is a good thing. Can you help articulate a few of the challenges that come with being a people pleaser?
There are certainly some benefits that come out of people pleasing, usually nothing good for the long haul of any relationship though, and mostly benefiting everyone but the people-pleaser themselves. Some challenges people-pleasers may face are finding it hard to say “no” to others, constantly seeking approval and validation from others and not trusting their own judgment or intuition.
People-pleasers also have a hard time setting boundaries and saying what they really think or feel, while often communicating the opposite of what they really mean. People-pleasers also tend to struggle with figuring out what they are truly feeling anyways because they’re so focused on everyone else’s feelings. Having a lack of self-awareness makes it extra difficult to create boundaries.
Does being a people pleaser give you certain advantages? Can you explain?
Being a people-pleaser can certainly have its perks, otherwise, why else would someone be putting their needs at the bottom of the priority list? On the outside, they seem like they have happier relationships because they go above and beyond to make sure they experience as little conflict as possible.
People-pleasers may also get a temporary boost of self-esteem because they receive positivity from others for meeting their demands. They may find themselves getting more opportunities at work because they go above and beyond minimum commitments to “prove” themselves to be worthy. With all these benefits, it’s no wonder why someone would continue doing these things. Who doesn’t like to experience no fighting in their relationship and a boosted ego?
Can you describe a moment in your life when you realized that your own people-pleasing behavior was more harmful than helpful?
I realized in a previous relationship that I let my people-pleasing go too far and it prevented me from really realizing what kind of relationship I wanted. This allowed poor treatment to continue because I didn’t find my inner voice and express what I wanted, nor come up with boundaries to protect myself.
That partner and I decided to both dive into the world of non-monogamy to see if it may be something we’d see as a net positive for our relationship. Because of my lack of inner exploration, I was unable to clearly communicate what limits felt safe for me, creating an endless loop of me feeling jealous, insecure, and unworthy. Despite all that, we kept see-sawing back and forth on the consensual non-monogamy front, making for a very unstable relationship and my own self-concept.
In your opinion, what are the common root causes of people-pleasing behavior?
There can be various causes to ignite people-pleasing behavior. Some reasons being that they grew up in a home being rewarded for putting someone else first and punished for self-expression. If they grew up with caregivers who were not emotionally available, they likely sought validation from others or through their achievements to signal their worthiness. Struggling with low self-esteem can induce people-pleasing as it’s likely their needs and feelings were ignored or invalidated so pleasing others would help them feel seen.
They may have also experienced trauma resulting from abuse or neglect and find it hard to trust others or tell people how they truly feel. People-pleasers are usually terrified of being rejected so they do everything in their power to make sure everyone around them views them as likeable. In many cultures, people-pleasing is the result of social conditioning. Things like kindness, generosity, and selflessness are highly valued, pressuring them to give to others at their own expense, and being celebrated.
How does people-pleasing behavior impact personal relationships?
Personal relationships may seem happy and normal on the outside, but for the people-pleaser, it can be a big show. When someone is people-pleasing they are not expressing their truest desires, feelings, thoughts, and keeping essential information for a healthy functioning relationship secret.
How does people-pleasing behavior impact professional relationships?
People-pleasing in the professional realm can keep the pressure high to “perform” above and beyond what is expected. The hardest part of that being that they are only human yet will be expected to go further than what is humanly possible. This can result in being fired for not performing, burnout, and even severe mental health issues.
How can long-term people-pleasing behavior impact an individual’s mental health?
Long term people-pleasing can result in the loss of one’s sense of self. They have gone so long putting a mask on for others, to be seen in a positive light, they don’t even know who they are anymore. Constant experiences of unhealthy relationships from people-pleasing can lead to damaged trust in others, themselves, and deep wounding of questioning their own worthiness.
In your experience, what is the role of self-awareness in overcoming people-pleasing tendencies, and how can individuals cultivate it?
The role of self-awareness is a crucial aspect of overcoming people-pleasing, which can be initiated by learning about themselves. Struggling people-pleasers can find encouragement by identifying their own thoughts, feelings, desires, and beliefs (instead of everyone else’s) as the first step to standing on their own. This can be done as a self-reflective exercise, with the help of a mental health therapist or coach, or the support of a trusted source encouraging self-exploration.
Here is the primary question of our discussion. Based on your experience or research, what are the “Five Strategies Or Techniques That Can Help Individuals Break Free From The Cycle Of People-Pleasing”? If you can, please share a story or an example for each.
1 . Setting boundaries helps overcome people-pleasing because it teaches others to respect their limits. This reduces the likelihood of being taken advantage of. Imagine someone who always says yes to extra work even when overloaded, promising to help with projects that aren’t even required. This can lead to burn out. After realizing the negative effects of the extra workload, recovery can look like setting limits on their workload and politely declining tasks when necessary, giving them a better work/life balance.
2 . Practicing self-acceptance is pivotal in breaking the cycle of people-pleasing. Take someone who constantly seeks validation through others’ approval. Once they begin practicing self-compassion by acknowledging their strengths and weaknesses, they will see they can become less reliant on others’ opinions. This technique is essential because it fosters a sense of inner security and reduces the need for external validation.
3 . Learning to sit with the intense feelings that can come with setting limits or boundaries can alleviate the hold of strong emotions. Guilt is often a common experience of people-pleasers when trying to stand up for themselves and It may feel uncomfortable saying “no” to someone. Learning to say no respectfully is empowering though. After expressing a true desire or preference to someone, it can be helpful to hang in there with the feelings as coping with discomfort is part of the process of setting a boundary.
4 . Exploring core values can lead to a sense of strength in verbalizing preferences and desires. After identifying what is important in life and relationships, people-pleasers can then make decisions about their life based on ideas and beliefs they want to live by. Take the idea of someone on the dating scene who values open and consistent communication. Imagine they find someone who demonstrates a lack of reaching out or responding to them every so often. Reflecting on their values would help them decide if this is someone that aligns with the kind of partner they want to be in a relationship with.
5 . People-pleasing can feel like an automatic response much of the time, where they might not even consider their actual truth or desires for themselves and will just go along with what they think others want to hear. Practicing a pause before answering questions can help people-pleasers slow down and identify if something truly aligns with their values.
What steps should people pleasers take to establish healthier boundaries?
I like to help the people-pleasers I work with through the process of differentiation. First by helping them identify their own preferences and emotions about the issue at hand, then helping them find ways to express these in an assertive way. This tells others how they want to be treated and what will happen if that is not followed through. The last but most crucial step in setting a boundary is following through with a consequence when it has been violated. All of these steps take practice so it is imperative to practice self-compassion in this process of growth.
How can someone who is naturally empathetic maintain their compassion while becoming more assertive?
It is possible to have empathy for yourself and someone else while also setting boundaries. Empathy is understanding someone else’s thoughts, feelings, and perspectives — but this doesn’t mean you have to agree with it or engage with it. If you err on the side of being more empathic, you can practice active listening and reflect your understanding of the other person’s emotions and practice compassion for yourself and others. Remember that advocating for yourself doesn’t diminish your empathetic nature.
What are the most common misconceptions about people pleasers, and how do these misconceptions affect their journey toward recovery?
A common misconception about people-pleasers is that people think they don’t have much of an opinion on things and are just agreeable, easy-going people. This view fails to shed light on the deeper issues of what’s motivating these behaviors, namely, the fear of rejection and not wanting to cause conflict. This can dismiss the people-pleaser’s struggles and make it seem like it’s “just a simple choice” to engage in this behavior rather than acknowledge the deep-rooted chains binding them to it.
What role can therapy or counseling play in helping individuals overcome people-pleasing behavior?
Therapy can assist with giving a nonjudgmental and safer space to explore and process difficult memories, feelings, and situations associated with people-pleasing. Counseling can also provide a space for the client to engage in role-playing scenarios with a professional to practice assertiveness over time to learn about other strategies to overcome people-pleasing.
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
If given the chance to initiate a movement, I’d focus on promoting comprehensive relationship education across different stages of growth. This would involve teaching both children and adults about emotional intelligence — assisting them in recognizing their thoughts, emotions, and beliefs, and guiding them in expressing and understanding these aspects. By doing so, individuals can develop valuable skills like empathy. Additionally, I envision this movement offering support for individuals to learn how to listen respectfully to others expressing their beliefs and preferences, as well as helping them navigate any discomfort that might arise from differences in viewpoints.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
My handle on all the socials is @paigebondcoaching, the Stubborn Love podcast can be found on all platforms, my therapy website is https://marriagecounselingfl.com, and people can start relationship coaching with me at https://paigebond.com.
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
Thanks so much I’ve enjoyed being part of this!
Paige Bond of Couples Counseling of Central Florida On How to Recover From Being a People Pleaser was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.