Stop ruining your relationships. Stop being a slave. Stop letting other people control you.

If you:

• Seek validation

• Apologize for no reason.

• Are afraid of being rejected.

• Have difficulty saying “no”.

• Overly concerned with what others think of you.

You’re a people pleaser.

Back then I would always say yes because I was afraid I’d lose friends. I wanted to be nice to everyone so I would feel worthy.

Getting happy over simple thanks made me feel validated and accepted.

And that’s exactly how you can accidently set up yourself for failure.

The greatest misery one can experience is to put everyone’s needs above oneself and neglect your own.

If you’ve ever felt like no one care’s about you, it’s because you’re always available.

Taking care of other people’s needs before yourself is a good way to signal “I’m low value” and people don’t respect commodities.

Not having enough balls to piss people off by saying no will cost you a lot of mental peace.

Setting boundaries and being an asshole is different.

The first includes taking care of one’s self and the other includes having the possibility to hurt other people without realizing it.

In this letter we will talk about why people pleasing happens and how to fix it.

The Trap of People Pleasing and Why it Happens.

If you’ve never understood why you tend to seek other people’s approval for no reason, here are some answers:

Wanting to be nice to everyone

You pretend to care.

You think being nice and solving everyone’s problem will make them like you.

You think if you shoulder people’s problems and listen to them vent you'll become a good person.

Then when you need help no one turns up. I know because I've been there.

I didn't have the courage to stand up for myself, risk being seen as an asshole and be fine pissing people off.

I would:

• Ask if I made them feel bad.

• Say sorry in every sentence.

• Help people even if it ends up hurting me.

If you experience something similar you have to draw clear boundaries because you are not responsible for all the problems in the world.

Aside from your family and few trusted friends, you have no reason to be nice to everyone.

You'll be exploited and used when you're essential and ignored when you need help.

Losing friends is part of the process. Some are meant to stay and some are meant to give you lessons.

Don't hold on when it hurts.

Attention Seeking

You're invisible and the only way you are seen is to help people as much as you can.

You appeal to people because that's the only way you can feel validated.

Most people don't look at you. Don't respect you.

Which makes you afraid of:

• Losing relationships

• Disappointing other people

• Being seen as weird for being alone

So you go out of your way to please their ego because you're afraid one day they'll withdraw the attention they give..

Societal conditioning has convinced most people that they need to be liked and loved in order to live.

Lacking the courage to be alone makes you sacrifice your worth, convincing yourself you don’t deserve better

Being bullied taught me my friends weren't my friends.

I hit rock bottom multiple times in my life and when it happens I always felt worthless.

Because everyone around me didn't care about my existence (except family). I don't know if you feel the same but we'll talk about it next.

Feeling you're never good enough (Trying to fit in)

This one is by far the worst:

• You feel intimidated to oppose

• You never stand up for yourself

• You always pretend you're okay

• You think you're always wrong and they're right

This leads to self-loathing.

I always mention self-sabotage and self-loathing because people are unaware they hate themselves.

You are chained to other people's opinions. Every decision you have needs their opinion.

This means you don't trust yourself.

Most people don't realize this but if they actually knew about this problem they could potentially solve 90% of the internal problems.

Most people don't care about you. Aside from your family and friends (Not always).

Internal Pressure: Trying to meet everyone's expectations.

You fear being an asshole.

You fear hurting other people's opinions.

You have no courage to reject someone's ideas or be rejected.

You become a slave to everyone's whims and wishes. Everything they ask you do without question.

A hybrid from the other 3 I mentioned above.

When you are friends with everyone you are friends with none. When you seek attention you get none. When you feel sh*t about yourself other people treat you the same way.

This is no coincidence. All 4 stack on each other.

The only way to get over this problem is through mental mastery.

Accept you can't be friends with everyone and accepting you're more than enough on your own way.

Since the more you try to meet other people's expectations the higher that expectation will become.

When you fail to meet the next bar of expectations, instead of being praised by your hard work — you'll be met with ridicule and insults.

So how do you get over this problem?

How to get over people pleasing.

Mental mastery is a fancy word for emotional control and self-belief.

You will have to wrestle with demons inside your head and accept insecurities.

You will deal with pain, past experiences and let go of unmet expectations.

Let's start with—

Be fine pissing people off.

Not everyone will love and like you. Some people are assholes and there's nothing you can do about it.

They won't understand and call you weird for setting clear boundaries. They get mad if they don't get what they want. They call you names so they can feel better about it.

You mustn't allow other people to walk all over you. They'll out you in their pockets if they can.

Being fine pissing people off doesn't mean you initiate fights and get yourself in jail. It means being fine losing friends, losing validation and accepting not everyone will like you.

Nice people are always used.

They are exploited and never respected.

If you ever find yourself in a situation where you do everything for other people but seem to be treated badly and no one appreciates you kindness —you are being used and exploited.

Being respectful and being nice isn't the same. Respect is mutual while being nice is one dimensional.

Respect works when it's a two way street not one way.

Emotional Control

The better you control your emotions the better your life.

The anxiety you feel whether you made someone feel bad or your fear of rejection isn't real. Emotions are not the truth.

Your feelings are subjective. A bias from your own viewpoint.

You must expand and allow other perspective to make sense. Before you believe what you did is wrong, ask yourself:

• Did I do it out of hate?

• Did I do to protect myself?

• Did I do it so people stop exploit my kindness?

Understanding why you did it in the first place will allow you to see connections and see if you acted out of trauma or from bad experiences that triggered a form of coping mechanism.

Never be too quick to judge.

Self-Acceptance

• It’s okay not to be average.

• It’s okay for people not to like you.

• It’s okay for people to reject your ideas.

You need to accept your insecurities. You need to accept what you don't like about yourself.

You seek validation because you aren't comfortable with yourself. You start to think "Maybe if my friends like it I'll end up liking it too"

You become dependent.

Without people saying it's good or acceptable doubts about your capabilities become a routine.

I hated the way my nose looked, I'd ask strangers if my nose look weird or if there's anything wrong with it.

I was insecure having black heads. Because I thought it was abnormal (I didn't know puberty was normal).

Your insecurities differ from mine. So you'll have to ask yourself what it is you hate about your body.

Being honest is how you stop being insecure. It's when you confront fear instead of fighting against it.

Pay the price

You will lose friends but not the real ones. You will lose relationships you thought were good.

As you start to prioritize your well-being —some people will get pissed off about it.

You were useful. You followed every order like a slave. Of course they won't go that easily.

Shame tactics, guilt trips and other boycotting strategy will be implemented.

An attempt to make sure you never run away.

This is a reality most can't accept:

• Afraid of being alone.

• Afraid of losing comfort.

• Afraid of losing friends.

• Afraid of losing familiarity.

Being put down makes you never believe in yourself again.

You will have to re-program your mind and ditch the excuses.

Your self-esteem has hit rock bottom. That's why you can't make decisions by yourself.

You need self-respect. You need to stop viewing yourself like a toy everyone can use whenever they want.

Self-respect

Respect is earned, never given. If you want to get better and actually have the balls to stand up for yourself — you need self-respect.

The way you look at yourself. The way you view your abilities and skills. The way you make opinions about yourself is called self-respect.

If you keep acting like a slave to everyone's whims. You will never get what you want. You will never get out from the misery you're feeling.

Everything compounds. The same with your mindset. You need to be careful how you talk about yourself.

• Tell yourself you're a loser and you'll turn into one.

• Tell yourself you're learning from your mistakes and you'll experience improvement.

Your subconscious listens all the time.

• Have the courage to stand up when you think it's right.

• Have the courage to disappoint other people.

• Have the ability to say no when you don't have to say yes.

Self-respect is earned when you do what you said you were going to do. You don't have to start big.

I started small. I started with saying no to my friends who never helped me with anything.

I stopped being everyone's slave. I prioritized my well-being and guess what? most of my friends never talked to me again. I was a convenient servant never a friend.

The same will happen to you. You'll have to deal with people leaving and some being pissed off about it. When that happens don't initiate fights and respectfully go away.

There's no merit in fighting a losing battle.

Now onto the next one.

The end point. Stop self-sacrificing.

Helping people is a good thing.

But it becomes bad when it turns into exploitation. And we all know how that turns out.

• Others take advantage of your kindness.

• Overtime you build up resentment.

• Negative self-image

If you relate — you’re not alone. I’ve always been the type to help people for no reason. I’d go out of my way to solve someone's problems even if they didn’t ask for help.

Some of my friends appreciated my kindness. But clearly some people just wanted the convenience. When I stopped they said ”You changed”.

You don’t have to be an asshole to stop being kind. You have to stop self-sacrificing.

If you can solve your problems. Other people can too. Trying to be the hero in everyone’s little inconveniences will turn you into a self-villain (The enemy of yourself).

You'll grow resentful because you can't say no. You'll grow to hate other people because you'll say "Why don't they realize I'm not okay with doing their favors?" But you must realize people are oblivious.

Unless you say you're not okay with it, they'll never know. Maybe you didn't even realize you— yourself being a people pleaser.

It's ironic because we think we know everything about ourselves only to realize we rarely stick to our words.

I hope this letters finds you well.

Being a people pleaser sucks but staying as one sucks even more.

Much love and see you next week

-Noat (Author of improvement letters)

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