Episode 171 - The Small People-Pleasing Behaviors That Add Up
Most women are familiar with what people-pleasing looks like. You say yes when you mean no, avoid conflict, or never ask for what you need. But some of the most exhausting people-pleasing doesn't happen in those big, obvious moments. It happens in tiny ways that have become so automatic we don’t notice them. In this episode, we're looking at these subtle habits through the lens of micro people-pleasing: the invisible, everyday behaviors driven by your nervous system that quietly steal your time, energy, and attention. Once you understand these small tendencies, you can begin interrupting them before they add up. Here's what I cover:
The surprising math behind how much time we spend replaying conversations and trying to keep other people happy
What micro people-pleasing looks like in everyday life and how it differs from more obvious people-pleasing behaviors
A self-assessment exercise to help you identify your own micro people-pleasing patterns
Why micro people-pleasing behaviors aren't conscious choices but responses designed to help you feel safe
How practicing "the pause" helps you interrupt both big and micro people-pleasing habits
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youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333Transcript
00:59
Today's episode, getting back to my people-pleasing roots, because I want to give you a different lens to look through some of the people-pleasing behaviors I'm going to be calling micro people-pleasing.
01:13
And most women, especially if you have been listening to this podcast, you know what the bigger people pleasing looks like. You know, it's saying yes when you mean no, it's avoiding conflict, it's never asking for what you need and it's keeping everybody happy.
01:28
And yes, all of those are people pleasing behaviors. And a lot of the people pleasing doesn't actually happen in those big moments. A lot of it happens in moments that are so small that we stop noticing them.
01:43
It's the way that we are adjusting what we do, what we say, how we look, how we present by like three to seven percent of what we would actually do if nobody cared. It's softening your opinion. It's apologizing before you've done anything wrong.
02:03
It's offering the solution to a problem that nobody asked you to solve. And these are sometimes small, sometimes tiny. They are very automatic, sometimes invisible. And because they're so small, they rarely feel like or they might not get the same attention that big people pleasing normally does.
02:26
But I want to call your attention to them today because when you start looking for these and you realize how many of them are happening every single day, it really adds up and it adds up in a way that really matters.
02:41
Before we go any further, I want you to do a little math with me because this is the math that I do with women when I'm talking to them about coaching or in my group coaching programs. I ask them to tell me how many hours a day they spend worrying, rehearsing, thinking that somebody's mad at them, talking to other people about whether or not they were too much or too offensive or if they should go back and fix it, dreading moments in the future where they think they're going to people please or replaying moments in the past where they're disappointed in themselves that they didn't do something better. They're feeling resentful and anxious and fearful.
03:19
And then because they're feeling all of that, they scroll or eat or distract themselves. It's a lot of time. And when I ask them to just ballpark it for me, most of the women that I coach and talk to say that it's somewhere between three to five hours a day where they are not in the present moment of their life.
03:44
They're either replaying yesterday's conversation or rehearsing tomorrow's. And one important thing to remember is that that doesn't mean that this is happening like sitting in a chair. Their body is doing other things, going to work, driving carpool, making dinner, you know, whatever, but it's the internal ruminating loop that just keeps churning and churning and churning.
04:08
And so most of the time they tell me that that is between three and five hours a day. Let's just kind of play that out a little bit. Three hours a day becomes 46 days a year. Four hours a day is 61 days.
04:28
And five hours becomes 76 days. That's an enormous amount of your time, energy, and brain space that just leaks out adjusting and trying to predict and wondering if someone is upset. That's gone because your mind is busy managing relationships and situations that aren't even happening in the present moment.
04:58
And here's the part that really fascinates me. Most of that time isn't spent on the big conversations. You've heard me do a lot of talking lately about the big conversations that I'm working with women on being able to have in a really comfortable, easy way.
05:12
What I'm talking about today are the tiny moments. It's not obvious people pleasing. It's invisible or internal people pleasing, the kind that is stealing your attention, your energy, and then so much of your life.
05:27
I want to tell you a quick story about a client of mine. She had received a text from her brother asking if she could watch their dog over Christmas. She got the message. She already knew it was a no.
05:40
But instead of saying no, her brain like immediately went to work. You know, maybe I could do this or what if I did. And that should feel familiar. My brain has done it 100 times. And so she offered to come another weekend so that the brother and his wife could still get away for a different trip.
06:01
She hadn't even said no yet. No one had expressed disappointment in her. No one was pressuring her. And no one had even suggested that she do it a different day. But her brain went full bore forward, solving a problem so that the brother didn't feel any discomfort.
06:23
The people pleasing didn't start when she offered another weekend. This is important. It started the minute her nervous system decided that it wasn't safe for her to let him feel uncomfortable or disappointed.
06:41
And it made her responsible for preventing that. So you're going to notice that same thing. You're going to have little teeny tiny flares of discomfort, or you're going to notice rules that are just kind of running in the background where you have already decided because of our good girl programming, our nervous system sends up a little signal.
07:04
Oh, we can't do this. It's not safe. It's not good. They won't like it. You're going to start noticing that. Or sometimes you're just going to notice that there's just this default habitual way you respond because that's just what good people do.
07:20
I had an incident like that happen. This is several years ago. I was sitting in the dentist's chair and the hygienist was cleaning my teeth and it was really hurting. And I think in the moment, if I had thought about it, I would have felt comfortable saying like, hey, this is a little uncomfortable.
07:38
Or when she asked me, how you doing? I would have said, actually, it's hurting a little bit. But I just had this internal rule going that I needed to pretend like it didn't hurt so that I didn't hurt her feelings or so that I didn't look weak.
07:51
And so I sat there, right, in pain for who knows how long now. I can't really remember. So I sat there in pain because that's what my kind of internal rule told me to do. These are instances of micro people pleasing.
08:08
Editing yourself to manage someone else's emotional experience. And once you see that pattern, you're going to start seeing it everywhere. For example, maybe you walk into work. Before you've even put your bag down, you're just, you notice yourself scanning everyone's mood.
08:27
Who's stressed? Who's irritated? Who's quiet? Then without realizing it, you've already started adjusting yourself to match the room. Or someone asks a question about a decision you've made. Maybe they're curious.
08:42
Maybe they just want some more information. You don't know because all they've done is ask the question, but your body hears criticism. And so you're already gearing up to explain yourself. You haven't been asked to defend your decision, but your nervous system is telling you we have to defend our decision here.
09:02
Again, it takes leaning into, is this a nervous system reaction or is this just a rule that I have been taught that I need to manage? Am I just following the rule here? Maybe somebody asks you to help with something and you know that you don't have the capacity.
09:18
But instead of saying, I can't, you feel like you have to leave a door open. You say, you know what, let me look at my schedule, which sometimes that is a perfectly legitimate thing to do when you don't actually know.
09:31
But if you know, that's not what you're doing, right? You're leaving that door open so that you don't hurt their feelings or disappoint them by closing it firmly. So you say, you know, maybe, or I'll see what I can do.
09:44
And you don't decide anything and nothing is clear, but that door stays open because closing it feels harder. Or maybe you're around someone who makes a joke that is at someone else's expense or isn't funny.
10:00
Maybe you laugh and you're laughing not because it's funny, but because your nervous system decides that smoothing over the awkwardness is safer than letting it just be silent. Or maybe you're using sorry a lot.
10:16
Someone bumps into you, sorry. You ask a perfectly reasonable question. Sorry. You need to get around someone who's taking up the entire aisle at the grocery store and you say, sorry. And again, individually, these might seem like small moments.
10:31
They're not very significant. But collectively, I want you to just think about the amount of time that it's taking. Every single one of them is time and energy that you are devoting to managing other people's discomfort.
10:49
So that's a great question. I want to just give you to start asking yourself. Whose discomfort am I managing right now? Just start asking. Just give yourself a space that is free of judgment. Now, we got to say that.
11:04
Yeah. Because if you're just going to like shit on yourself because this is coming up, no, then no, I don't want you to do that. But if you can make this into a little experiment, a little investigation, whose discomfort am I managing right now?
11:18
That is so valuable to just look around and see. Am I managing it because my nervous system is telling me that this isn't safe or because it is just a habit? Here's what I think is so important to understand.
11:33
Most of these decisions aren't conscious. You didn't sit down and decide to explain yourself or apologize or soften your opinion or solve someone else's disappointment. Your nervous system made that decision in milliseconds.
11:47
It detected possible danger, possible discomfort. Somebody could be mad. Somebody could be disappointed. Somebody might think you're selfish. Somebody might misunderstand you. So before your conscious mind even catches up, you're editing.
12:03
And that's what makes this work actually feel really frustrating sometimes, because consciously, I know women, and I have said this to myself, like I am a 45-year-old or now 52-year-old woman. Why am I doing this?
12:20
I shouldn't do this. It's okay to say no. I know I'm allowed to take up space. And of course you do. Knowledge and logic aren't the problem. It's the fact that your nervous system protection gets in there faster than your thinking brain can intervene.
12:41
I want to make an important distinction. Accommodating people you love isn't unhealthy, right? Healthy relationships require flexibility. Sometimes you move things around. Sometimes you help when you don't really have time or energy to help.
12:56
And sometimes you inconvenience yourself because somebody you care really needs you. And that isn't people pleasing. The question isn't whether or not you're adjusting. The question is, am I choosing it for reasons that I like or did it get chosen by a fearful nervous system?
13:16
Remember, on the outside, the behavior looks identical. It's only by looking at our internal experience can we really know the difference. On the one hand, if it's really from a place of calm and groundedness, then it feels like I want to do this.
13:37
If it's from a place of nervous system fear, it will feel more like if I don't do this, something bad will happen between us or something bad will happen to the relationship. One behavior where we accommodate and we give ourselves freely, that creates connection.
13:56
And this other kind of pure nervous system reaction where we are afraid, that actually erodes relationships with ourself and eventually with the other people as well, because we end up feeling resentful and lonely after the fact.
14:16
And so it is really ironic that in a lot of the ways that we are trying to protect the relationships with these little micro adjustments ends up undermining them. Okay, so I want to give you a little self-assessment.
14:32
Inside my group coaching program, we call this shitty bingo because I'm just going to give you some examples and I want you to just keep track. And if you get a blackout, it just means you're normal.
14:44
So I don't want you to ask yourself, am I people pleasing or do I do this? I want you to ask yourself instead, how many of these just feel automatic? Okay, here we go. Do you start explaining your decisions before anyone has questioned them?
15:02
Do you leave invitations open because saying a clean no feels too harsh or too mean? Do you offer solutions when someone is disappointed, even though that's not, they never asked you to? Do you scan the room when you walk in and immediately start adjusting yourself?
15:19
Do you say sorry when someone bumps into you? Do you stay quiet when something hurts because you don't want to inconvenience or make the other person feel bad? Do you soften your opinions with phrases like, you know, this might be a stupid idea or I could be wrong even before you've said what you think?
15:40
Do you change your restaurant order because everyone else is getting something different? Do you check your phone after sending a text and then start rewriting the conversation in your head? Or feel responsible for finding a way for everyone to leave the interaction feeling okay?
15:59
Do you research something for 30 minutes before asking a simple question because you don't want to bother them? Do you rehearse or rewrite a text message five different ways before you actually send it?
16:12
Do you wait until you are 100% sure that you are right about something before speaking up? Do you offer to do extra work because somebody else just looks stressed? Do you pretend that you're flexible when you actually do have a preference and you actually do have limitations, but you're going to work on redoing those behind the scenes so that you can accommodate this person in front of you.
16:37
Do leave a conversation wondering if you've talked too much. These behaviors might not look related. They're happening in different places, you know, at the dentist, over text, at work or at dinner, but they're all running on the same nervous system programming, which is if I can manage everyone else's emotional experience, I will stay safe.
17:02
That really matters. And it's something that we can work on together. Because the goal isn't to become someone who never accommodates anyone. The goal is to stop automatically making yourself responsible for everyone else's emotional experience.
17:20
And it starts in a place that is much simpler than you might think. It starts in the pause. The pause is a tiny moment that you take on purpose when you start seeing these patterns between the request or what you're seeing happen and your response.
17:41
It's where you take a tiny beat in between the question that they're asking or the request that they're making and your explanation. This is a practicable skill to just pause for a second and notice, is this just a rule that I'm following?
17:59
Do I feel unsafe here? Is this just a rule that I'm following? Or do I actually feel a little bit of discomfort here? And can I calm that discomfort for myself? That pause is where self-trust begins.
18:15
It's where you remind your nervous system that disappointment is actually survivable, that awkwardness is not the end of the world, that someone else's feelings can exist without becoming your responsibility.
18:29
So that's the value of the pause. It gives you a moment in big people pleasing scenarios and in these micro people pleasing habits and reactions to have a different experience that costs you less time and energy.
18:49
My free workshop, Speak Up, is happening every week. This is what we are practicing. We are practicing that pause until it becomes available to you in real conversations in real time. It's free. Come join me.
19:03
You can come as many times as you'd like because I want you to be able to have the pause, to know how to use it, and then to start using it in your own life. The link is in the show notes. I would love to have you there.
19:16
Last thing, if this podcast has been helpful to you, I would really be grateful if you took a second to rate it and then share an episode with someone that can benefit. Thanks for being here. I'll see you next week.
