People Pleaser

In this post from Lou Tice at the Winners Circle he talks about the need many of us experience to please other people, to gain their approval. And how the costs of such a need can be extraordinarily high.

Are you a people-pleaser? How important is it to you to get the approval of others? Let’s talk about our need for approval.

Most of us feel good when we’re basking in someone else’s approval, especially when we are kids and the approval is coming from a parent or other authority figure.

For some people, this feeling of approval comes to be so important they want to have it all the time. Then, instead of simply preferring to have approval, they come to believe they must have it. But the costs of such a strong need for approval can be extraordinarily high. It robs you of your right to think and feel like the unique individual you are, because you’re always trying to behave in a way that lives up to someone else’s expectations instead of to your own. It stops you from following your dreams, because, after all, what if others disapprove?

Too much need to please can leave you in a state of exhaustion, keep you from expressing your true feelings or thoughts, and create anger and resentment that often goes underground to cause trouble. It’s healthy and natural to want approval, and we all want to please others, especially those we are close to. But if we want to give to others in a truly meaningful way, a strong foundation of self-esteem and a good sense of what we think, feel, and want as individuals has to be there, too.

You see, when it’s all said and done, the better you treat yourself, the better you’ll be able to treat others.

Lou Tice
The Pacific Institute

Once again Lou has hit on something that has set my thought processes into over-drive. I think I’m guilty of needing the approval of others too much. Whereas I should be happier with who I am, the person that God created; and the person that God loves just as I am — surely that ought to be all the approval I need.

The daily emails from Lou Tice at the Winners Circle always get me thinking, and are a great help. Do please subscribe yourself if you think you would benefit from more like the above, it doesn’t cost anything.