My People Pleasing Issues

There was an existential crisis that took a year, of slowly and completely letting go of God and Christianity. It is now obvious to me that my non-belief was a truth that I struggled with for many years and I was just in denial because of what I was taught those thoughts meant about me. I held onto things WAY LONGER than I should have out of the fear of being bad, being seen as bad or disappointing others. I was expecting there to be a major identity crisis as there can be a grief period and people who leave the faith can go through a period of anger and feel very lost. I have felt a little lost at times, I'll admit. But I have not felt the anger I expected to feel. Instead I feel relieved. I think it's because I had stopped believing years ago, I just needed to admit it to myself and let go. The bonds of religion are chains I carried all on my own. I was the one who had to decide to put them down. 

I do continually have thoughts and realizations as this transformation continues and the one I had this morning is centered around the part of my personality obsessed with people pleasing. This post is actually going to end up being an exercise in shadow work.

I have an innate need to serve others and to please others. I don't know if this is simply a personality trait (flaw) or if it is the result of some childhood insecurity. I have never been to therapy to try and discover the reason. But, if I really think about it and I look at not only my patterns of behavior but the thought patterns I experienced throughout my life on this front, I am starting to recognize a few things to be true. It is interesting, for sure. 

One thing I realized is that the things I was taught from a VERY young age about expectations and behavior and the payoff I got when I was cheered on for being good fed my little ego and are probably the building block to this (in some ways) toxic personality trait. I have touched on this before, but I built my entire identity around "being good." I was recognized for my initiative and helpfulness to others in school (other students and adults) and placed above the other students in places of leadership from line leader in elementary to Student Council President in high school and everything in between. I was placed on special committees and councils all throughout my school years and I always worked extra hard on the extra projects to prove I was not only better than the average student but that I deserved to be there. The praise I received was like a drug, but I was always humble about it on the outside. 

Being "good" and exceeding the expectations of all superiors I respected along with my work ethic made me an easy choice for leadership positions. Being the oldest child not only in my immediate family, but the eldest grandchild of eleven, I was given authority over all children younger than me and I was treated as an equal to the adults from an early age which fed my ego. 

Church introduced me to the greatest people pleasing opportunity in God and Jesus. Being good is the name of the game in Christianity. Whether or not that's the actual message, it is definitely the one that gets translated. I latched onto it at first. And even after I stopped attending church, I still modeled my life around "serving God," so I could be the ultimate people pleaser. I convinced myself that serving God through serving others was my destiny and my purpose. While I still feel service to others is extremely important, the reason for it is changing. 

As I grew older and left school I still had a need to people please so I found a partner that wanted and needed someone to "handle" everything and who gave affection in such a way that I always felt above everyone else in the entire world, to him. Add to that the idea that being submissive to my husband also pleased God and I was hitting peak people pleasing status.

I created my entire identity around my ability to be a good person, to serve others, to please people and exceed their expectations of me. The root of this was the idea that by doing these things I was also pleasing God and that because of this I was special. I had always held myself in pretty high esteem, but convinced myself I was doing it all for God. In reality I was feeding my own ego and insecurities. 

A couple of things I realize now.

1. I had convinced myself that I was a good person, good student, good daughter, granddaughter, wife, Christian, employee, volunteer, community leader, because of the positive feedback I would get from others; that validation. I always told myself that I was doing what God was asking me to do. I now see that I did all of this stuff for myself, to be validated by others. I have been driven by ego. My need for validation from others and my need to maintain the identity I had established, I opened myself up to be taken advantage of by others who KNEW I wouldn't have the ability to say no to requests for help. This applies to those adults in my family who pawned their kids off on me at a young age and the teachers who got me to grade their papers. It applies to the people at work who got me to do their jobs for them and it prevented me from living authentically. I had curated a version of myself I didn't even realize was fake until it became nearly impossible to keep up any longer. 

2. If you take God out of the equation and the BIG DADDY to please, everything else starts to fall by the wayside as well. I am able to see more clearly and now that I realize that I do what I do for myself and not for others (and it's okay) I can start to peel away the good girl layers and start to live a more authentic life. I can work on the ego issue. I can take on the acts of service I WANT to do instead of feeling obligated to agree to every request out of fear of displeasing God or fearing people seeing through the "good girl" thing. Taking God out of the equation opens the opportunity for healing because it exposes the TRUE reasons for the behavior. I will always struggle with my ego. I was raised to believe I was special for a multitude of reasons, by family, church and school. If you're a person who is into astrology, I am a solid Leo which might make you crack up. It's so obvious why this is a struggle! I Becoming more selfless and humble will always be something I am striving toward. But, not to please God or anyone else, just to be a better human.

This change has been a decade in the making. I look forward to living my life, now. I also would be remiss if I didn't take a moment to recognize my husband. This man, who grew up without religion of any kind, has endured my metamorphosis as I have shape shifted and reinvented myself for going on 24 years. It feels cheeky to call him a Saint, but you get the idea. He has loved me through all of it and albeit reaped the benefits of my need to make him happy. That part will not change. I am no longer a super submissive wife, but I still make sure he is well cared for in all aspects. I just do it for him instead of doing it out of the need to please God. As I prepare for my 40th birthday in 2021, I am ready to live my most authentic life ever; starting now.