You’re not nice, you’re just people pleasing

“You’re not just being nice; you’re people-pleasing…”

Growing up, I came to the realization that people-pleasing stunted my growth and hurt my mental health. The worst thing I did for myself was to be passive and keep people that weren’t deserving of being part of my life.

🙅‍♀️ Here are some actions that I genuinely thought I was just being nice, but in fact was people pleasing behaviour:

1️⃣ Always agreeing with people, and doing what they want

2️⃣ Offering to do things even when you don’t want to

3️⃣ Not asserting your boundaries due to fear of rejection

4️⃣ Not showing your true feelings to avoid conflict/ accepting blame to keep the peace

5️⃣ Going out of the way to accommodate people

6️⃣ Doing for others what they could do for themselves (enabling)

Not attempting to victimise myself, but externally, people-pleasing makes others think you’re a pushover and decreases the respect they have for you. Internally, you start losing your moral compass, making it easy for you to lose your personality.

☑️ Here are some tips I learnt to say no respectfully to take care of my boundaries:

1️⃣ Always be decisive! The clearer you are about saying no to someone, the better they will respond.

2️⃣ Express gratitude for being asked! It softens deliver and show the other party that you care about their position too

3️⃣ Take your time! If you’re uncertain about it, it’s always okay to revisit the conversation with a clearer head.

💭 Here are my favourite ways of saying no:

1️⃣ Sadly, i have something else going on.

2️⃣ I don’t have the bandwidth for that right now.

3️⃣ Thanks for thinking of me! But i’m not able to.

#selfdevelopment #selfcare #mentalhealth #mentalwellness