Don’t get me wrong, we all have our day to day duties and responsibilities, it is part of life, and we do have our roles- mother, father, wife, husband, daughter, son, friend, colleague… however for many of us the ratio of doing for self versus doing for others is drastically out of balance.
And when this imbalance happens we begin to feel tired, out of balance, depleted or burnt out, anxious, restless, bitterness and resentment.
Worst of all it makes us feel confused and unable to make a decision easily because we get stuck in what we should be doing rather then what we want to do. We end up “shoulding” our way through life instead of being or living. And so the pattern of people pleasing begins.
In the process of people pleasing we lose ourselves and our core essence as our focus is on what they need rather then what we want. We become responsible for them and their needs and feel that sense of duty and obligation. And if we do put ourselves first we end up being riddled with guilt or feeling selfish.
Does society condition us into this process? Is there another way we can be doing things which may yield to a greater feeling of win-win?
I remember the feeling within myself before I left my marriage. I was lost, confused, disempowered and had no idea who I was anymore. There was this mild voice within which seemed to be guiding me, but the fear and sense of responsibility echoed louder in my head. Making a decision at that time was so painful because I was trying to please so many different people that I had no idea what I wanted or needed any more.
It seemed that my sense of self and sense of self worth was defined by this role and I was getting some kind of a boost or sense of importance with them needing me. If I was needed then I was important and special; if they needed me then I had worth and purpose. However, I was reaching a stage where this was becoming less and less fulfilling and a deeper purpose and sense of self was calling. I was also completely burnt out because I had been a martyr and was putting so much into my life.
What we have to confront is the secondary gain in people pleasing. This means that there is a subconscious part of us that gets fulfillment when we please others. My secondary gain was that feeling of self worth and purpose because I was denying myself of my true wishes.
Here is an example of how this pattern may be formed and how secondary gain is developed:
Julia is 3 years old and is at kinder. She draws really well and starts to get noticed by her teachers for doing a great job. The teacher shows off her work to the class and says “Good Girl, Julia, your work is fantastic; here is a gold star for you!” Julia loves the attention and the recognition and of course the gold stars and makes a decision to keep on trying harder.
She loves the reaction she gets from people when she makes them happy or when they reward her so she keeps pushing herself. She gets to school and strives to be the best in class. She helps out around the house and behaves really well so that she gets that feeling of recognition and reward. When she gets recognized she begins to feel important and so loved.
When she is reprimanded or criticized for anything it is like torture for her. She blames herself and gets really upset with herself and promises to be better next time. She begins to feel that if she does anything wrong she makes people feel bad and if they feel bad then they don’t like her. She hates the feeling of not being liked or accepted and begins to do anything to maintain that positive reinforcement and that feeling of being liked and loved.
This feeling of love builds up her sense of self. She realizes that she is loved because of what she can do and the more she does the more she is loved. She makes a decision to try and do as much as she could so that she will always be loved. Her definition of love was linked to what she does and how much she excels.
However over the years, Julia began to lose her true self. She forgot what it feels like to play and be creative. Everything had to be perfect and that idea of perfectionism became so overwhelming that she found herself procrastinating and stopping herself from trying things because she began to fear failing and looking bad. She lost a lot of her enthusiasm and passion and began to resign herself to doing things she had to do. As long as she was loved it was ok, as long as everyone else was happy, then she was ok. However there was always something missing.
So we can see that often the secondary gain in people pleasing is to be loved and feel worthy. We will do more to get recognition and approval and avoid the pain of punishment, rejection, isolation or abandonment.
As we grow and mature, the patterns of the inner child become unfulfilling. (Read last week’s post)
Our true self, our essence, our soul remains depleted, unacknowledged and unfulfilled so life feels empty and meaningless and there always seems to be a missing piece of the puzzle to our happiness and fulfillment. We begin to feel restless and begin searching for something more.
In understanding your secondary gain and intention behind what you do, you can begin to become aware of what is motivating your behavior and begin to make steps towards changing your inner focus and inner intention. When we change this focus we begin to fulfill the mature, adult self and not the inner child. We begin to truly grow and feel fulfilled.
When the focus shifts from making others happy to questioning what makes me happy and fulfilled, we begin to heal and dissolve the limiting, self fulfilling beliefs of our inner child. This follows two important steps:
1. Ask yourself: Is my self worth made up of what I do or who I am? And if it not about what I do then who am I? This means we begin to reconnect with our inner qualities. The essence we were born as and not the decisions made by a 3 year old. We begin to realize that we are caring, loving, playful, fun, inspiring, creative, passionate, happy, joyful, strong, courageous, enthusiastic, intelligent, capable and very much loved. With our focus on our virtues we now realize that it is those virtues which make up our self and our self worth , not so much about what we do. It is all about who we are being.
2. Taking personal responsibility: Once we define and connect with our true self the next step is then to allow ourselves to BE that true self and shape our lives around being that self. This now means we embrace our decisions on how we respond to situations and ensure that all our responses come from those key virtues. This now means we align ourselves with our values and our lives begin to take a new shape with new focus and motivation. We begin to feel more energized and clear, and we begin to feel more complete and empowered. We begin to shine and begin to be a true inspiration to others. Yet, the difference here is that we are now doing things as a celebration of self without any demands and anything to prove so it becomes a WIN-WIN.
So when you strip away your sense of obligation and duty, then who are you? What makes up your true self worth? And what is the power and purpose that this amazing self brings to the world?
To your truth and freedom,
Cheryne
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