Recovering people-pleaser
I am a recovering people-pleasing, over-achiever, stop
conflict at all cost individual. I was thinking about this over the past week
since I have nothing planned but going to work and being home. In every new
phase of life, I have had to get over pleasing people. From high school, going
into college, to grad-school, starting my career, to getting married and having
a baby. I am fairly sure my people
pleasing, backing down, and shying away from conflict is a conditioned or
learned habit, as well as part of my personality.
I have touched on a
family trauma (I guess you could call it that) from 2006. As you probably could
piece together, leading up to that point in high school, our house was not the
most peaceful. Towards the end, it was all of us having to predict and
anticipate what was going to upset my bio-dad that day and how to tip-toe
around his temper tantrums to just find some peace in the home when he was in
that season of his life. From a younger age, I learned quickly to pick up on
emotional cues, under handed comments, and reading situations from my dad. As a
kid, my brother and I were taught not to talk back, which is part of growing up;
you don’t talk back to adults or parents out of respect which is something all
my parents have focused on. I got good at keeping my mouth shut (sometimes). At
home I knew if I let words fly, I would get one of my bio-dad’s irrational
lectures or he would lash out over something a parent should not get that
degree of mad over. I learned to say whatever he expected/needed me to say in
order to pacify his need of control and anger at the world.
This part of my story was a snippet in time. Please do not
think that my childhood was pure chaos and a mess. It was not. My childhood was
blessed. Like I said, the chaos was more towards 2005-2006 when my dad’s life choices
were not the greatest. My original family had some great times together. Being
older now, everything is hindsight. Plus you have to take into account that I
am looking and reflecting on things I remember as a kid through the point of
view of a now married adult with a child. My “original” family unit was where I
first learned conflict managements through what was modeled for me starting at
a young age: try your best to be happy and put on a smile to avoid conflict (no
attitude), do what was expected and achieve, do what would make my dad happy to
avoid an outburst, and don’t bring it up.
What I learned in my home was not explicitly taught to me.
My mom taught me great social and conflict skills growing up through elementary
and junior high. I was taught healthy conflict resolution yet lived in
unhealthy conflict. I guess you could call it survival, adapting to
circumstances, and get by with the least of your sanity taken. Over the years, I
have had to break what I taught myself when I was younger. At my core, what I
know is true about me is that I hate hate hate having people mad or upset at
me. I do not like knowing that others do not like me. That little 13-year-old
girl inside me cannot have people not liking her. Typing these statements, I am
not pinning this all on the environment I grew up in. I take ownership of this need
as well. Some of this desire to be liked comes from my personality and from my
own insecurities. I used to apologize, do anything, and go out of my way to
avoid or bar anyone getting hurt feelings. Right or wrong. Inconvenience or
not. My doing or not. Your run of the mill people-pleaser. I have come a
long way, but in high school and college era I couldn’t deal with people being
upset at me because my identity was wrapped up in being a “good person”. And my
definition of being a good person was having no conflict or issues with anyone,
having everyone always like me.
I had a conflict come up towards the end of college with a
close friend that changed how I handled when people are upset with me. I had
many friends in college but there was one person who became one of my best
friends at ASU. I had met him through kinesiology and anatomy classes sophomore
year. We had the same major, and we started taking classes together if our
schedules allowed. For 2.5-3 years we studied together, hung out, went to
events/concerts, took classes together, and we became close friends. He was
more competitive than me in all aspects of life (in a good way that I admired).
He always tried to get a better grade than me in the countless classes we had
together. I enjoyed it! I thought it was a fun banter to have whenever tests
came up in the semester. Well, we both applied for graduate school our senior
year, normal typical timeline of applying to get into a school straight out of
graduating. A handful of schools that we applied to were different and we also
picked a few of the same schools. Like everyone applying, we were hoping to get
into one of the top 3 we picked. We both got picked for an interview on the
same day at one of the top schools we applied for. We flew out together, did a
little exploring of the city, and interviewed separately. Following the interview,
it may be months till you get an answer. You are left wondering for what feels
like an eternity while you are still completing senior year. We both ended up
loving that school we visited together over all the other schools we
interviewed and applied to separately. I heard back from the school close to
Thanksgiving, a month or so after the interview. I accepted, mailed my check to
reserve my spot in the class, and felt a bunch of stress leave me. My friend
had not heard back yet. If you have applied to grad schools before, you know
how this game goes. You are left there sitting, waiting, wondering, and
silently panicking in your mind, which is understandable because it is what you
have been working for your whole undergraduate career and everything in life
(at that moment) is riding on getting into a school. After I got that
acceptance letter, he stopped texting me, stopping asking me to hang out, and
stopped asking to study together. We went from hanging out every week to no
communication in a matter of weeks. Senior year you are taking half the credits
because most the core classes are completed and now it is taking the higher
level classes you are interested in, so it is easy to not see as many of your
friends since everyone has different interests in a major. When I did see them in person, he was distant
and short in responses; it was not the same. But deep down in my gut, I knew
the reason. I knew him well and his personality; we had been friends for almost
3 years at that time. It made me sad. It bugged me deep down to my core to the
point that I lost sleep. I think it took me a week to get the courage to call him.
I wanted to talk to try to see if I did something wrong or said something
offensive. To my surprise, he picked up. I asked him if he was mad at me. He
said something along the lines of yes because I had gotten into his top pick
and he could not get passed that. I apologized that his feelings were hurt but
I also told him that it was not my fault and the window of acceptance letters
was not closed yet. I do not know where I got the courage to say that because
if I had been sophomore year, I would have apologized profusely trying to be a
“good person” and wanting the friendship back. We hung up amicably. It took a
few months for him to get over it. The friendship went back to semi-normal
after he got an acceptance letter into the same school. I was hurt by how he
had treated me; our relationship was never that same after that, and I never
brought it up again all through grad school. I could not change the fact that I
had received my acceptance before him. I could not change his mind to not be
mad at me. I released that friendship to however it was going to play out and
stopped working so hard for him to be my friend. Through this, I learned how to
let go of the need to have everyone like me, because sometimes like this
situation, it is out of my control whether they like me or not. I also learned
that solving conflict a healthy way (by calling and calming talking) gave me
more peace than avoiding having a conversation all together, putting on a front
that the friendship was fine and normal.
What I have took away from that situation and continue to
learn over time is that my past backwards definition of being a good person, is
not a particularly good one. It is a bad one that I have since chucked from my
life. To be quite honest, it was an immature definition that I needed to grow
from. At my job, like anyone else’s job, “customers” get upset. I am the one
they work with regularly, have a rapport established, and I am tangible (vs an
insurance company). I have learned to not take it personally, approach the
person/family with sympathy and understanding, and to see it through their
point of view; a parent who is concerned and flustered trying to give their
child everything he/she needs. Even though a parent may get mad or frustrated with
me, that does not make me a bad person. Most of the time, if not all the time, I
am giving it all my effort to help them to my best ability. I must remind
myself of that whenever it happens.
To this day, deep down I want everyone to like me and to
think that I am a kind person. I know that is impossible, despite what that
little junior high girl inside of me craves. I am improving at being okay with
occasional tension in relationships. I am working at healthy conflict
management and resolution in a new season of life because guess what is coming
around the corner? My son talking and growing into a toddler who will
eventually become an opinionated pre-teen.
Please do not think I am telling you to go look for conflict.
That is the opposite of what I am saying. What I am attempting to explain is
that there is a healthy way to disagree and a not so healthy way, which I am
still learning. There is a delicate balance of tension in the world: you need
conflict or tension in order to launch newness, create, learn, or grow. Maybe
the conflict is internal, interpersonal, or with a belief system. Conflict is a
part of life. What makes the difference is how it is approached, navigated, and
hopefully solved. Could you imagine if everyone agreed on everything? Or you
never questioned your thought process or beliefs? There would be no uniqueness,
growth, change, or new ideas in the world which would be more boring than being
stuck at home during COVID-19. I will never be able to avoid conflict; it is
going to happen even despite my best efforts to avoid it. It has taken me
awhile to come to this point in my life: I am not a people-pleaser; I am a
peacemaker. This means that everyone might not be happy, but I do my best to
bring calmness and harmony to a situation. What I pray for is that with any
conflict, whether in marriage, work, family, friends, ministry, or personal, I
approach it with grace, a spirit of humility, a heart ready to listen, and a
peaceful attitude, ready to grow from it.
Shalom during this period of uncertainty,
Rachelle
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