People-Pleasing Isn't Kindness: Understanding the Trauma Response That's Exhausting You
You cancel your weekend plans again to help a colleague with something that isn't urgent. You smile and say "of course, no problem" while internally screaming. Later, you lie awake replaying the interaction, furious at yourself for not setting boundaries but terrified of what would happen if you said no.
If this sounds familiar, you're not just being "too nice." You're likely caught in a people-pleasing pattern that developed as a survival strategy—and it's exhausting you for good reason.
Let's Get Clear About What People-Pleasing Actually Is
People-pleasing isn't kindness, though it often gets confused with it. Real kindness comes from choice and authenticity. People-pleasing comes from fear and compulsion.
Genuine kindness says: "I want to help because I care about you." People-pleasing says: "I have to help or else I’m a bad person."
The difference? One feels good (even if inconvenient), the other feels like a prison sentence you can't escape.
Where People-Pleasing Actually Comes From
Here's what most people don't understand: people-pleasing is a trauma response. It typically develops in childhood when you learn that your safety, love, or acceptance depends on keeping others happy.
Conditional love: You got the message that you were only lovable when you were "good," helpful, or convenient. Your worth became tied to your usefulness to others.
Unpredictable caregivers: If your parents had volatile emotions, you learned to manage their moods to keep yourself safe. You became an expert at reading the room and preventing explosions.
Emotional parentification: You were expected to meet your parents' emotional needs—listening to their problems, keeping them happy, or managing family dynamics that should never have been your responsibility.
Criticism or withdrawal: When you expressed needs, boundaries, or authentic emotions, you faced harsh criticism, rejection, or the withdrawal of love. You learned that being yourself was dangerous.
Family conflict: Your job became keeping everyone happy and preventing conflict, even when it meant sacrificing your own needs and authentic self.
The Adult Aftermath: What People-Pleasing Looks Like Now
If you developed these patterns as a child, here's how they might be showing up in your adult life:
You say yes when you mean no. Your automatic response is agreement, even when you don't want to do something or it's genuinely inconvenient for you.
You avoid conflict like it's dangerous. The thought of someone being upset with you creates genuine panic. You'll go to extreme lengths to keep everyone happy.
You apologise for existing. "Sorry" is your most-used word. You apologise for taking up space, having needs, expressing opinions, or basically being human.
You can't access your own preferences. When someone asks what you want, you genuinely don't know. You're so used to deferring to others that your own desires have become mysterious.
You feel responsible for everyone else's emotions. When someone's upset, you automatically assume it's your job to fix it, even when their feelings have nothing to do with you.
You're exhausted but can't stop. You know you're overdoing it, but the fear of disappointing someone feels more terrifying than burning yourself out.
You feel resentful but guilty about it. You're angry about always giving more than you receive, but then you feel bad for being angry because "they didn't ask you to do all that."
The Hidden Costs of People-Pleasing
People-pleasing might have kept you safe as a child, but it's costing you dearly as an adult:
You lose yourself. When you're constantly adapting to others' needs and preferences, your authentic self gets buried. You might not even know who you really are anymore.
Your relationships become inauthentic. People can't truly know or love you if you're always showing them what you think they want to see rather than your real self.
You attract takers. People-pleasers often find themselves surrounded by those who are happy to take without giving back, creating even more resentment and exhaustion.
Your needs go unmet. When you never express what you actually need, you can't receive genuine care and support from others.
You experience chronic stress. Living in constant fear of others' reactions keeps your nervous system activated, leading to anxiety, burnout, and physical health problems.
Breaking Free: What Recovery Looks Like
Here's the hopeful truth: people-pleasing is a learned behaviour, which means it can be unlearned. Recovery involves:
Recognising it's a trauma response. Understanding that people-pleasing developed to keep you safe helps you have compassion for these patterns rather than judging yourself for them.
Learning to tolerate others' disappointment. This is scary but necessary. You need to discover that people being upset with you isn't actually dangerous—it's just uncomfortable.
Developing a relationship with your authentic self. You'll need to get curious about what you actually want, need, and feel, separate from others' expectations.
Practising boundaries in small ways. Start with low-stakes situations to build your tolerance for saying no and expressing your real preferences.
Healing the underlying wounds. The fear driving people-pleasing needs to be addressed at its roots—those early experiences that taught you that being yourself wasn't safe.
Why Schema Therapy Is Particularly Helpful
Schema Therapy is excellent for people-pleasing because it addresses the core schemas (or deeply held beliefs) that drive these behaviours. Common ones include:
Abandonment: Believing that people will leave you if you're not constantly pleasing them
Defectiveness: Feeling that your true self is fundamentally unlovable
Self-Sacrifice: Believing that you must put others' needs first to be worthy of love
Through Schema Therapy, we work to heal these deep beliefs and develop healthier ways of relating that don't require you to disappear.
You Don't Have to Keep Exhausting Yourself
If you recognise yourself in this description, please know that you don't have to keep living this way. The fear that drives people-pleasing feels very real, but it's based on old information from when you were small and truly dependent on others' approval for your survival.
As an adult, you can learn to trust that healthy relationships can handle your authentic self—needs, boundaries, and all. You can discover that being genuinely kind (when you choose to be) feels completely different from compulsive people-pleasing.
The path forward involves developing a secure relationship with yourself first, so you can show up authentically in your relationships with others.
If you're ready to explore how people-pleasing might be connected to your early experiences and learn to break free from these exhausting patterns, I offer a 15-minute consultation to discuss whether trauma-informed therapy could help you reclaim your authentic self.