I'm someone who...

Now that I know, I can’t un-know and I’m seeing it everywhere; the impulse to please that gets in first, before other thoughts have had a chance to form themselves and make a more salient case.

My pleasing impulse is so well formed this glides in first, claiming the space.

I am staying with a friend and fold her towels and put them on her bed. Later, she thanks me for washing her towels. I have not washed her towels but I don’t want to contradict her because that might make her feel bad. So I smile and say, you’re welcome. And then panic...what if she realises her towels aren’t clean? What if she asks me a direct question: did you wash my towels? What then?

I have two consultations lined up at two different hairdressers. The first one says, ‘So, shall I book you in?’ and I say, ‘Yes, of course...’ and then descend into a ridiculous farce of ‘ooh not sure when I’ll free, maybe I can call you’ instead of simply saying, ‘Leave it with me and I’ll come back to you, I’m going to think about it’ or ‘I’m off to see another hairdresser and then I’m going to decide.’ You know, something simple and honest and true.

I’m walking the dog before going home for dinner that my friend is cooking for me. She wants me back to eat, but the dog is loving the walk and wants to stay out. I feel torn, anxious - who to please? I become aware of the cringing need to satisfy the other. ‘You’re a creep’, I was often told as a kid. Yes, I think, as I feel groundless and torn, ruptured by the need to perform the impossible; yes I can feel that now. I am a creep.

The churchyard displays a sign saying, ‘Keep dogs on lead’. I do. I’m a rule follower. And then my dog sees a squirrel. Squirrel chasing is divine pleasure for my dog - foolhardy, fleeting...a burst of reckless raggle taggle joy. So I drop the lead and she dashes at full pelt, on a flurry of self-righteous barks. It makes me so happy. Then a man walks past me and he meets my smile with a furrowed brow. The connection lasts less than a second, but in that time I manage to fabricate several stories: he thinks that it is cruel for dogs to chase squirrels; he thinks I am cruel for allowing it; he thinks I’m showing disregard for the rules of the churchyard; he thinks I’m a twat. I am a twat.

Noticing my people pleasing in real time is helping me to observe the insanity that has woven itself into the foundations of my identity.

People pleasing makes me a liar. I nod and smile and say the thing that I feel will most please you in the present; yes, I washed your towels. I don’t seem to believe that the other could tolerate even a second of discomfort so I swaddle them with a lie...but that lie then exists in the unfolding minutes, hours and days, creating a discomfort that I then have to endure for the long term.

People pleasing discounts my wishes and desires - do I want to stay out with my dog or go home for my dinner is a question I would never ask myself. Irrelevant! ‘What’s needed of me’ is the question I ask instead...what can I do to create the least impact. It’s as though I’m trying to get through life without ruffling any feathers anywhere...leave no trace.

People pleasing means I am not in touch with my own authority. I walk my dog with a cringing anxiety, aware that the dog has needs and other people have needs and their dogs and children have needs and it’s too fucking noisy. Who do I prioritise? Without access to my own inner authority, I simply don’t have the mechanism to make a choice.

But as I clocked the lunacy of stories that rolled through my mind as I passed the scowling man in the churchyard, like a beam of sanity breaking through black clouds of angst, I had the very simple thought:

That simple statement is the vehicle that brings me back to my self; to what I want; what I choose; to my authority; and the ability to back myself, with honesty, in the moment.

I’m someone who lets their dog chase squirrels.

Just that.

I’m someone who...

I am (working hard on becoming) someone who stands by and stands up for who I actually am.

Jeez. That was an agonisingly difficult sentence to write.

But now it is written.

And on I go.

I am happy you are here. I am working this out in real time and using this diary as a way to sense-make as I go. Too many thoughts swirling does no one good, so this diary is a butterfly net, swooping ideas into order on the page. I am sharing in the hopes that, if people pleasing is loud or quiet in your life, you might find some solace in the companionship as you travel alongside me.