Content Warnings: Depression
People Pleasing
One of my biggest pet peeves is people-pleasing. As someone who once was a people pleaser, once I grew out of this mentality, I realized how detrimental it is to one’s mental health. One of our biggest desires as a society is to achieve a sense of community with others. For people-pleasers, achieving this sense of community can be a motive behind people-pleasing tendencies, along with avoiding conflict overall. I engaged in people-pleasing behaviors for both reasons. When I grew out of this mindset, sometimes I couldn’t even fathom how I allowed myself to people-please.
I realized that my people-pleasing behaviors were severe enough that I allowed constant disrespect to thrive in my life, which ultimately led to severe symptoms of depression. I would let my morals become skewed if someone held different morals from mine, and I would agree with their morals for the sake of continuing a connection. I would let people cancel plans last minute, gaslight, manipulate, and overstep boundaries, and I would constantly say the phrase, “it’s okay, I understand,” for the sake of avoiding conflict and continuing a connection. Eventually, I realized I’d had enough of dealing with constant disrespect and began establishing a strong sense of self. I realized that I should be treated with respect, that my time is valuable, and that my existence is worthy. I realized I should not feel tied to another being and make myself malleable to another person’s will.
Whenever I see someone engage in people-pleasing behaviors, I see myself within them. While it irritates me to see someone become malleable to another person, I also hold empathy and understanding for how that person may feel. Despite it all, I wish that more people grow out of people-pleasing behaviors because it truly is not worth it in the long run. I always ask such people, “Aren’t you tired?”
