If you’ve ever caught yourself bending over backward to make others happy or seeking constant approval, you’re not alone. Many people find themselves trapped in a cycle of over-giving and striving for validation, often without realizing the deep-seated fears and feelings of inadequacy driving these behaviors.
I’ve certainly found myself stuck in this pattern, and noticed sneaky ways I was still people pleasing even after I thought I’d worked through it. When we abandon pieces of ourselves for the sake of others, or silence ourselves for other’s peace, we are engaging in people pleasing behaviors.
If you’re ready to break free from these patterns and embrace a more authentic way of living, you’ve come to the right place. Let’s dive into the roots of people-pleasing and explore how you can start the journey toward self-acceptance and freedom.
Sneaky ways You are People Pleasing
People pleasing can show up in so many different forms that you might not recognize that you’re still finding ways to seek validation and acceptance from others. It’s not just about saying yes when you want to say no (although, it’s that too!), but it’s also abandoning yourself for the sake of others, punishing yourself for your imperfections, and pushing yourself past your limits to feel 'acceptable'.
Sometimes, even after addressing our people pleasing behaviors, we find new ways to seek validation and suppress ourselves. Take a look at these sneaky ways people pleasing might show up for you:
Constantly Saying Yes
Agreeing to every request or invitation, even when it’s inconvenient or exhausting for you. You might say yes to extra work, social gatherings, or helping others, even if it means sacrificing your own time or energy.
Avoiding Conflict
Going out of your way to prevent disagreements or conflicts, even if it means silencing your own opinions or suppressing your own needs. This could involve agreeing with others' viewpoints or not expressing your true feelings to keep the peace.
Over-Apologizing
Apologizing excessively for minor mistakes or even for things that aren’t your fault. That constant nagging that you’re not good enough causes you to see yourself as a burden to others.
Seeking Excessive Validation
Frequently seeking reassurance and validation from others about your decisions, appearance, or actions. This could involve asking for constant feedback or approval to feel secure about yourself.
Over-Giving
Giving more time, energy, or resources than you can afford, often to the detriment of your own well-being. This might include doing tasks for others that they could easily handle themselves or spending beyond your means to help someone else.
Self-Abandonment & Suppressing Your Own Needs
Neglecting your own needs and desires in favor of accommodating others. For example, you might skip meals or ignore your personal time to fulfill someone else’s request.
Striving for Perfection & Over-Achieving
Setting unrealistically high standards for yourself in order to gain approval. This could manifest as perfectionism in your work or personal life, becoming a workaholic, or simply never acknowledging your own success or achievements.
The Hidden Roots of People Pleasing: Fear and Shame
If you’ve ever wondered why people pleasing is a really difficult behavior to change, it’s because it’s fueled by strong emotion. This underlying emotion is often fear and shame. This emotion drives a belief that in some way, you aren’t good enough. This core belief can cause you behave in ways to try to prove that you are good enough – such as over-giving or over-achieving -or to compensate for not feeling good enough – such as self-abandoning and ignoring your boundaries.
When we get to the root of this belief, we often find it stems from early childhood. The fear of not being enough or the shame we carry from believing that we are flawed in some way is often the result of childhood experiences that influenced our self-perception.
The Inadequate Inner Child
Behind every people pleasing behavior is an inner child who felt inadequate or unworthy. There are many, many scenarios that could lead to a child feeling inadequate. Some examples that have come up in real client sessions are:
· An over-critical parent that constantly pointed out your flaws, causing you to see yourself as “bad”, unacceptable, or unlovable
· An emotionally unavailable or distant parent whom you never felt seen by and therefore, felt you had to constantly go above and beyond to seek their love and validation
· An unpredictable parent who caused you to walk on eggshells because you never knew if they would be understanding or completely explode causing you to stay quiet and self-sacrifice to avoid conflict
As a child you have limited life experiences to draw upon to make judgements, and therefor, you judge experiences such as the examples above, at face value. This means, if your parent makes you feel unacceptable, you don’t have the ability to logically or rationally think about the situation, you simply believe that you are unacceptable.
As an adult, with our fully developed brain and years of life experience, we might be able to see that our parents have flaws that make them react to situations in a way that makes a child feel bad, but that it’s not the child that’s bad, it’s the adult that’s exhausted or stressed, or carrying baggage from their past. As adults, we can draw upon our experiences to make different judgements about how something has made us feel, but as a child, we don’t have that luxury.
This is why many of the issues we struggle with as adults stem from those early years of childhood. We simply didn’t have the tools or experience to make better judgements or process our emotions, instead, we simply accept what we feel as if it is the truth. This is how we form core beliefs about ourselves that lead to self-sacrificing and people pleasing behaviors.
Addressing the Root-Cause of People Pleasing with Hypnotherapy
Hypnotherapy gives us the unique opportunity to get straight to the source of our people pleasing behaviors by releasing the emotion and reframing the beliefs on a subconscious level.
When we enter a state of hypnosis, we are bypassing the logical, rational mind and going deep into the illogical mind – the subconscious. The subconscious is the illogical, irrational mind because it holds emotion and beliefs that don’t necessarily make sense.
The conscious mind will try to make sense of the irrational beliefs and emotions from the subconscious which is why we come up with all sorts of reasons to support the belief that we’re not good enough, when really, it’s none of those reasons, it’s simply a feeling we’ve been holding onto since childhood.
Releasing the Emotion & Reframing the Belief
When we use hypnosis as a tool to access the subconscious mind, we can work with that inner child who feels unworthy and inadequate and release the fear and shame that has been fueling those people pleasing behaviors.
With the underlying fear and shame released, we can strengthen a new sense of self-belief that comes from a deeper place of self-acceptance and love. This is where the magic happens!
Because we are getting straight to the root of the people pleasing, it’s typical to notice changes right away. You might feel like a weight has been lifted and it no longer feels necessary to engage in those old people pleasing behaviors. You might start to see yourself in a new way, where you deeply believe you are worthy of happiness, love and peace.
Getting to the root of people pleasing results in lasting changes. Trying to change your behavior without addressing the emotion and belief that fuels it is a tedious task. It will require you to continue to adjust your behavior over and over, because the underlying emotion will constantly urge you toward those unwanted behaviors.
Next Steps
People pleasing often has roots in fear and shame that stem from early childhood experiences. Unknowingly, we are carrying out beliefs we created based on experiences we had decades ago. It can feel challenging to change those people pleasing behaviors without addressing the emotion that fuels them, which is why hypnotherapy can be such an effective tool.
By accessing the subconscious mind in hypnosis, you are able to release the stored emotion and reframe your beliefs that will lead to lasting change.
If you’re tired of watching yourself going around and around in the people pleasing cycle, perhaps it’s time to go a little deeper and release the root. Comment below if you’ve found this helpful or book a Free Consultation to speak with me directly about taking the first steps toward healing.
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