Routinely appeasing other people is a tough habit to break, but it’s possible to learn to stop with the right tools and support.
Whether it’s saying “yes” to requests you don’t have time for, avoiding conflict to keep the peace, or constantly putting others’ needs ahead of your own, being a people pleaser can lead to stress, burnout, and resentment. You may think that you’re being nice or drama-free, when in reality, you’re letting others cross your boundaries, suppressing your own needs, and ultimately sacrificing your well-being.
Low self-esteem, a need for the approval of others, or a fear of rejection, may be the reasons behind the urge to put others’ needs before your own. In other cases, people pleasing may be a result of a mental health condition such as anxiety, or depression, or obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), where the need to please others is tied to avoiding conflict or alleviating stress.
Learning to recognize when and why people pleasing behaviors happen is necessary to break the cycle. By addressing the root causes of people-pleasing—whether through therapy or self-reflection—you can start to build healthier patterns, set and maintain strong boundaries, and learn how to say “no” without guilt.
What is a people pleaser?
A people pleaser is someone who is constantly putting other people’s needs before their own, whether that’s to avoid conflict or gain approval from others. “Generally, a people pleaser strives to make others happy,” says licensed therapist MaryBeth Overstreet, MA, LPC. “They may want to help others, but it becomes detrimental to the individual when they stop taking care of their own needs, experience guilt or shame, and lead to setting unhealthy boundaries with others.”
Some examples of the negative effects of being a people pleaser include:
- Feeling anger, resentment, and frustration
- Avoidant behaviors
- Unbalanced and weakened relationships
- Stress and anxiety
- Loss of self-identity
- Decreased self-esteem
- Unstable boundaries
Signs of a people pleaser
Understanding if you’re a people pleaser is the first step in making a change. By recognizing signs, you can implement strategies to change these behaviors.
- Difficulty saying “no”: This often manifests as saying “yes” or taking on more responsibilities than you can realistically manage. Typically, the difficulty in saying no stems from a fear of disappointing others or letting them down.
- Low self-esteem: Your self-worth may be heavily influenced by others or their approval. When your self-worth is dependent on others’ opinions, it can become difficult to make decisions that prioritize your own needs.
- Feeling guilty for prioritizing yourself: You may believe that other peoples’ needs are more important than your own. Over time, this habit can lead to a sense of obligation, where you feel that you must continually meet others’ expectations in order to maintain your relationships or sense of worth.
- Neglecting self-care: You may find yourself skipping meals, not sleeping enough, or not prioritizing your work in order to cater to others.
- Fear of rejection or fear of being disliked: You may worry that setting boundaries or saying “no” will upset others or cause them to think less of you. This fear can lead you to overextend yourself, saying yes to requests even when you’re stretched thin.
- Agreeing with everything: This might look like not having your own set of opinions due to the fear that others might disagree with you. Over time, constantly agreeing with others can lead to feelings of frustration or resentment, as you may start to feel disconnected from your own beliefs and desires.
Causes of people pleasing
Understanding what drives your people pleasing tendencies can help you take control of your behaviors and make intentional changes.
- Insecurity: If we’re unsure or insecure about something, including our decisions, we may reach out to others for validation or approval. Over time, insecurity can affect a relationship, as it can lead to an imbalance where one person’s needs and desires are consistently prioritized over the other’s.
- Past experiences: The way people have responded to your people-pleasing behavior in past relationships can shape and reinforce the tendency to continue this pattern. If your actions were met with approval or affection, you may have learned to associate people pleasing with gaining love or acceptance. This behavior may have been learned during childhood, especially if it was modeled by family members. For example, you might have observed a parent or caregiver who only showed affection when you were compliant or did things for them.
- Perfectionism: If you strive for perfection, you may be trying to reach unattainable goals and meet unrealistic expectations of others.
- Fear of conflict: If the idea of someone being mad or upset with you is distressing, you may go to great lengths to avoid disagreements, often at the expense of your own needs.
Mental health conditions related to people pleasing
Sometimes, people pleasing may be a result of a mental health condition. In these cases, these behaviors can serve as coping mechanisms to manage feelings of anxiety, insecurity, or a lack of control or certainty.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
OCD is a chronic mental health condition characterized by obsessions, which are recurrent and intrusive thoughts, urges, feelings, sensations, or images that cause anxiety. In response to obsessions, someone with OCD does compulsions, or repetitive behaviors or mental acts, in order to neutralize a thought or decrease distress.
Overcommitting, a lack of boundaries, or seeking others’ approval may be compulsive behaviors for many subtypes of OCD, says NOCD therapist Melanie Dideriksen, MA, LPC.
“If you struggle with the fear of being a bad person, you might engage in all of these behaviors as a way to reassure yourself,” says Dideriksen. “If you overcommit then you can say to yourself, “Well I’ve done more than what is expected, so I must be good.” You might think “If I say no, I am selfish and therefore bad.”
Over time, this cycle can intensify the compulsive need to please others, making it harder to break free from these patterns.
Anxiety
Similarly, someone with anxiety might have people pleasing behaviors to decrease distress caused by conflict or rejection. The thought of disappointing others or causing tension in a relationship can feel overwhelming. As a result, people-pleasing can reduce the discomfort that arises from the fear of confrontation. You might say “yes” to avoid conflict, even when it stretches you beyond your limits—believing that keeping the peace will ease their anxiety.
Both in OCD and anxiety, the fear of negative judgment, whether it’s the belief that they’re a “bad person” or that they’ll be rejected, can drive the need to please others.
Depression
Anhedonia, or loss of interest and pleasure, is a core symptom of depression. As a result, you might feel like there’s no point in asserting your needs or setting boundaries. You might convince yourself that accommodating others is easier, even if it means sacrificing your own desires or feeling overwhelmed.
Childhood trauma
Children who were raised by parents who were neglectful, emotionally unavailable, or overly critical may develop people pleasing behaviors as a survival mechanism. In environments where love and attention are conditional or unpredictable, children often learn to prioritize the needs of others over their own in order to gain affection or avoid rejection. When their parents or others are not pleased, they may become fearful that they will be punished or abandoned.
In this case, children may not have a secure attachment style, or feel comforted by their caregivers. Instead, they may have avoidant or anxious attachments—meaning that they learn to manage their own distress without the caregiver, or may become overly preoccupied with seeking approval and constantly fear rejection or abandonment.
Complex PTSD (C-PTSD)
People with C-PTSD may develop a “fawn response” as a coping mechanism, and it involves people-pleasing behaviors as a way to avoid conflict or further harm. This differs from other forms of trauma responses including fight, flight, and freeze.
While fight, flight, and freeze are more focused on self-preservation, either by confronting danger, escaping it, or shutting down —the fawn response is centered on “winning people over” and being accommodating to others in an attempt to create safety through submission.
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How to stop being a people pleaser
1. Establish boundaries
Boundaries are a set of guidelines we create to protect our well-being, maintain healthy relationships, and manage stress. These boundaries can be physical, emotional, sexual, or financial, and they help define what is acceptable behavior from others.
An example of setting boundaries include:
- Letting someone know that they’re invading your personal space or that you’re uncomfortable with physical contact.
- Communicating when you need time alone or space to process your emotions.
- Expressing your comfort level regarding physical intimacy.
- Saying “no” to commitments or requests that you can’t meet, and prioritizing your time for self-care, work, or rest.
Setting boundaries ensures that the other person respects your needs and values, creating a foundation of mutual respect and understanding.
2. Seek mental health support
If people-pleasing behaviors are driven by a mental health condition such as anxiety, depression, OCD, or past trauma, it’s essential to seek support from a mental health professional.
For conditions like anxiety and depression, treatment often involves a combination of medication and cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), a form of therapy that helps identify and change negative thought patterns and behaviors. Generally, working with a trauma-informed therapist can be helpful in treating people pleasing behaviors that formed as a result of childhood trauma.
On the other hand, if people pleasing is caused by OCD, exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy is the most effective treatment option created specifically to treat the mental health condition. In partnership with a specialized therapist, you’ll work together to gradually expose yourself to intrusive thoughts and triggers that cause anxiety. Then, you’ll sit with the distress that obsessions cause without performing compulsions in response.
“If the compulsion is to overcommit to something, then we may practice saying ‘no’ more frequently,” Dideriksen says. “We might lead up to this by writing a script about saying no to someone. In the script we may have whoever we are saying ‘no’ to be upset with us. Maybe they cut us off. Sometimes we will sit with the discomfort of the worst case scenario.”
3. Avoid making excuses
Sometimes, you may make excuses to justify people-pleasing behaviors or not enforcing boundaries. For example, you might say, “I don’t want to upset them,” or “I’ll just do this one thing to make things easier.” While it’s natural to want to avoid conflict, making excuses often leads to you sacrificing your own well-being for the comfort of others.
You can remind yourself that you have the right to say “no” and that it’s not your responsibility to manage others’ feelings.
4. Be comfortable with being uncomfortable
Not being a people pleaser means becoming comfortable with the possibility of disappointing or upsetting others at times. This doesn’t mean you’re being unkind or unfair by setting boundaries for yourself and your relationships. Instead, it means prioritizing your own well-being and recognizing that it’s healthy and necessary to put your needs first.
In fact, some people might be upset initially when you begin setting boundaries, especially if they’re used to you always saying “yes” or prioritizing their needs. It’s important to remember that their discomfort is not your responsibility. Instead, you can understand that everyone has different needs and expectations, and that it’s impossible to meet them all.
5. Remember to start small
You don’t have to make drastic changes in your habits. Start with small, manageable steps that feel comfortable for you. For example, practice saying “no” to small requests that don’t align with your priorities, or set clear limits on your time by scheduling moments for things you prioritize.
You can also begin by identifying one area in your life where you feel a lack of boundaries, whether it’s in your personal, professional, or social life.
Find the right OCD therapist for you
All our therapists are licensed and trained in exposure and response prevention therapy (ERP), the gold standard treatment for OCD.
Bottom line
It can be incredibly difficult to set boundaries, especially if you’re used to people-pleasing or have a deep fear of conflict. However, setting boundaries is essential for maintaining your mental health, well-being, and the health of your relationships.
Key Takeaways
- A people pleaser is someone who puts the needs of others before their own to avoid conflict or gain approval from others. This can have many downsides including causing anger and resentment, weakening relationships, and breaking boundaries.
- There are various reasons why people engage in people-pleasing behavior, and in some cases, it can be linked to a mental health condition, such as anxiety, depression, PTSD, or obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD).
- Breaking out of the cycle of people-pleasing can involve establishing clear boundaries, becoming comfortable with uncertainty, and reaching out to a professional for help.
- If your behaviors are driven by anxiety or depression, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is an effective treatment option. On the other hand, if people-pleasing is a compulsive behavior associated with OCD, a more specific approach, known as exposure and response prevention (ERP) is recommended.