The Hidden Cost of Always Saying Yes | A Bit of Optimism: Feelings at Work | PART 1

Today, what I want to talk about is people pleasing. Just before we get going, I just want you to know that I want this to be the best experience for you, and I will do anything I can so that you're happy. Are you people facing me? Yes. It works. I'm so pleased. Think about the last time someone asked you to do something at work and you said yes. When you said yes, did you mean it? Was it like a real, full-bodied hell yes? Or was it more like a "yeah, yeah, totally?" Did you say yes with confidence? Or was there a tiny voice inside you screaming "What are you doing? You don't have time for this?" Followed by total remorse or self-loathing as you slowly recognize that the future you now has more work than you can handle. If any of this sounds even vaguely familiar, then congratulations. You have people pleasing tendencies. And even if you're not a full-card carrying people pleaser, we've all done this to ourselves out of a desire to be a good team player or out of fear of saying no. Here's the irony. Whoever was asking us would actually have been fine with him. If only we knew how to give it. Instead of taking a summer hiatus, we're presenting a special five episode series of a bit of optimism to go deep on human skills. The things that help us connect, collaborate, and succeed in any human relationship. That's why I invited Alex Simon to join me. She's an adjunct professor at Yale and founder of LifeShop, where she teaches emotional intelligence. And over these five episodes, we will tackle some of the messier human interactions, like having hard conversations, taking accountability, listening, and giving feedback. And in this one, people pleasing. While so many people are focused on what skills to learn in the age of AI, the people that will succeed are the ones that are doubling down on their human skills. Because even in a world of computers, we still work with people. And being a good colleague or friend means learning how to manage expectations properly. There's and hours. We will cover three big themes in this episode. First, we debunk the myth that always saying yes is how you get ahead. That it's how you earn trust or get promoted and become indispensable. In fact, saying yes can actually hurt those things. We talk about what actually works. Then we'll explore a six-word phrase that can get you out of almost any over-commitment. You can use it today. No therapy, no personality overhaul required. A guilt-free solution for people pleasers everywhere. And finally, we offer ways to spot people pleasing behavior before those good intentions turn to burnout. That high performer who can never say no, they're closer to the edge than most people realize. And before you get too good at saying no, please listen to this episode. And if you enjoy this episode, also please remember to subscribe. This is a bit of optimism. [Music] So people pleasing affects a lot of people, more than I think people realize. And it is the desire to sometimes avoid conflict, sometimes to ensure that somebody else is getting what they want feels good, going out of your way to make sure that everybody is okay. But the reason it can be dangerous and destructive, and the reason I wanted to talk about it today, because in theory it sounds like a nice idea, but it can very often be very self-destructive to the people pleaser. It amplifies all kinds of insecurities. It also sometimes makes them do things they don't want to do, break their own boundaries, all kinds of things. And very often it doesn't actually please the people they're trying to please. So it's sort of like in the long term. So it's kind of like a zero zero. I think the tricky thing about people pleasing is that it's kind of like an extreme version of things that are good and adaptive. Like it's normal to want to be generous, to say yes to things and to want to be liked. And I think that the where it tips over and to people pleasing is when it becomes almost like an existential need of like, oh, I feel like I'm going to combust if I don't say yes to this thing or tell them I can meet this deadline even though I know I can't. Or I'm like over apologizing even though I know it's not my fault. Or yeah, like taking on too much work, there's so many different ways that it exhibits itself. And I think that we think of it as like a personal characteristic. And every single time I teach people pleasing, I'm shocked by how many-- Or teach people how to stop-- Let me teach you how to be a better people please. Well, that's just-- More apology. You can teach that one. Yeah. So yeah, when I teach stopping people please. I'm shocked by how many examples-- most people-- many, many people have examples that are tough to do with work. And it's because it's an area of our life in which we're constantly being asked for things. Who to say yes and we have to say no all the time. Can you be a-- can you be a people-pleaser at work but not in your life? Yes. Or do you think like it's like you're a people-pleaser and it just exaggerates at work? I mean, I think that there's overlap. But I know people who are really people pleasing at work but not in their personal lives. And I also know the reverse. You're really people pleasing in life but at work you're like, oh no, no, I can maintain my boundaries and I can say yes, I can do this, no, I can't do that. It's really interesting to me how it shows up in different areas of our life. I also don't think it's like a binary. I don't think it's like, oh, I am or I'm not a people-pleaser. Right. I think it's more like to me people pleasing is about how can I say yes what I mean yes and how can I say no when I mean no. And so it's a subtlety and it's a gray area and it's happening all the time. Yeah, I think it's-- I think what we're talking about is the dial which is important. Like all of us are people pleasing at some point even when it's slightly unhealthy. Yeah. And for people who are people pleasing who are hearing this even that word they're like, oh, that's me. And it always comes in that sort of way. Like, nobody's ever like, I'm a people-pleaser. People like, you know, it's what I think so interesting about it is there's a lot of self-awareness for people who are. And it is-- I don't know if it's in the most extreme I think it is, Jane. But I think people are kind of like either resigned to it or don't know how to get out of it. But it's always, I'm a-- that's me. Yeah. The reason I think it's important to talk about it, obviously because I want to help some of those people overcome the extreme people pleasing. But even for people who wouldn't classify themselves as people pleasing, I think it's really important to understand it if you-- because if you work with somebody who's a people pleasing, you're sometimes accidentally pouring gasoline on their little fire and not making them feel good at work. And so it's an important thing to talk about even if you're not a people pleaser. Because probably you work with one. And it really-- You probably work with one. Yeah, and it really impacts the whole team. Like, I remember, I used to work with someone who I was really close with personally. And she was kind of a chronic people pleasing situation. And it took me a while to figure it out because we would all agree, okay, we're going to do this. We're going to do it by Thursday. We're going to do this and that. And then she just wouldn't do it. And-- She was in the room agreeing to the deadline. And then didn't meet the deadline. And I'd be like, hey, where is it? What's going on? And then nothing. And I wouldn't have thought of that as people pleasing because there's so many other things. It's like, oh, it's incompetent. It's lack of communication. It's just like, there's so many other things. But really, she was just saying yes to something that was beyond her capacity. Because she didn't want to disappoint. And it's not because she was lying hiding and faking. It's because there's a lot of people who say yes to things because they're lying hiding and faking. And they don't want-- It's a bit of an imposter syndrome. And they don't want-- This is not what we're talking about. This is saying yes because you don't want to go against the grain. Because you find going with the flow. And everybody else has agreed to it. And I don't want to disrupt it. Even if I have information that everybody needs to know, I don't want to be the one to be the negative, Nelly here. Yeah. And I also think I totally agree. And I think in the moment, her experience was like, oh, I can do that. Yeah. You know, it's not lying and-- It's not-- It's not lying, I'm faking because in the moment it feels like she can't do it. She talks to herself into it. Yeah. And then the second afterward, there's like the shit. And then there's resentment everywhere. Then she resents herself. Like, why don't I do it again? She resents the team or she resents the assignment. And now she's getting in trouble because she missed the deadline. And now she's letting the team down and now all the-- The team's spiral. Now it shows up. Right. Totally. I didn't feel like a faking-- Of course I've done that. And of course I've been intimidated by the room or the project. And I know when I'm people pleasing, who's my tone of voice is different. Right? So like, Simon, you game? I'm like, yeah. Yeah. As opposed to-- yeah. And what do you think you're trying-- What do you think is going on, Pete? In my brain is like-- You sure? Like, in my brain is like the little angel in the devil on my shoulder. And the devil is like-- You know, do it. And angels like, do you want to do this? You sure? And I don't want to disappoint the other person that I'm not interested or that I'll offend them. You know, hey, Simon, can you do me a favor? And I want to be like, no, no. And so I'm like, OK. And now I'm at the position where I've had to-- It's exactly what's happened, where I have to unstick it. Where I'm like, hey, remember I said I was going to do that? And what-- The lesson that I have learned, and I'm better than I used to be. But the lesson that I've learned, and this is, I think, the first lesson to combat people, pleasing, I think, is people are actually very comfortable with a know upfront. And it's-- How do I clean that? I don't fuck that, right? What I've learned is like, if you just tell somebody know upfront, they're actually OK with it. I've learned more people are comfortable with a know. Yeah. When they say, can you do this? They're actually asking, can you do this by this deadline? And it's not-- passive aggressive. - There's something in our system that believes like the world will end if I say no. - If I say no. - And I think the calculus there, or if I'm trying to unwind the interlogic that's going on in my head, there's a part of me that's like, well that'll just be future Alex, what else to deal with. You know like, present Alex wants the easy thing, but it's kind of like you're hungry and you wanna eat junk food. - Yeah. - You know, you just like wanna be like, okay I wanna eat all the, I always wanna eat all the shitty food, but then you know you're gonna feel bad later. You know, it's not gonna impact your health. - One of my close friends, Kim, her mantra, and I try and remember it, if it's not a heck yes, it's a heck no. - Mm-hmm. - You know? - Yeah. - And like, 'cause, or the other one that I was like, you know, would you do this tomorrow? It's like, hey in six months, can you do this? Like yeah, future assignment. - Future assignment would love to do that. - It's like an amazing thing to do. And the question is would you do tomorrow? I'm like, no. Well then if you don't wanna do it tomorrow, you don't wanna do it in six months. - I think that's a really useful thing. I think I personally struggle with the, going back to the heck yes, heck no. I kind of struggle with it because more often than not, I feel really intense and vival. And some part of me wants to do it, some part of me doesn't. Or all of me wants to do it, but another part of me knows that I can't. And I think when things are more obviously a black and white yes or no, I find it easy. I personally-- - It's not like yes, it's like, yeah, so what you're saying is, it's fine and theory, but things are greater than that in reality. - Yeah, I think-- - Including our own. - Yeah, there are many different parts of me in those parts, one different things. And I think that the heck yes, heck no dichotomy doesn't often map onto my experience. Yeah, just doesn't, I find that the context is much richer and more dynamic and more complex than I often think it's going to be. - So when you teach people come to your stop, people please in class. And I'm very curious, obviously I'm, you go around the room and you ask people to describe their experiences. I'm very curious what patterns you've noticed. Is there one kind of people pleasing, four kinds of people pleasing, infinite numbers of people pleasing? Like what do you hear in the classroom? - There's so many, it's a really good question. There's so many different types. I think one big one is like a conflict avoidant people pleasing, which is like any tension, any rocking of the boat feels like it's the world is ending. And so I'm going to just do anything to avoid a hard conversation. Another one is like a kind of addiction to approval. I think that's a big one. - Interesting. - And I think this is a really interesting one that plays out at work because sometimes if we, like there's this like a parental boss dynamic where like our boss can almost become like our parental figures and our worth feels conditional on them saying like you did a good job. - And you'll do anything to get that. - You'll do anything to get that. And there's a part of me that really believes that a lot of what's going on at work is like I wanna know what I have to do. I wanna do it. And that I wanna be patted on the head and told that I did a really good job. And like if I can do those things, like if I had an clarity on what needs to be done, if I can feel useful in doing it, I'm contributing to something that's beyond myself. And I just like get the satisfaction, the very simple satisfaction of being useful. And then I can be recognized. And someone can give me praise for what I've done. Like those three things scratch a lot of our core human needs. - There's a very important nuance here, which is you said addicted to the approval. I think everybody wants to know they did a good job. And everybody wants their bosses to recognize them. And it's healthy to want it. It drives a lot of us to do good for those we serve and wanna make them proud, especially if it's a good boss, we really wanna make our leader proud. They've invested in us, we wanna show them the investment was worth it. But you didn't, that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about the addiction to it, the need, which is it stops being about the work. And it starts being about the approval. And that's an important nuance. - I totally agree. And I think it's about what is the price that I'm willing to pay to get that? And so for me, the way that I think about it is, if I'm willing to kind of like do my work and do the things that need to be done, and I'm setting clear boundaries, and I'm kind of like doing my thing, and then I'm getting approval. Great, that's like a healthy beautiful system. - That's all right. - Whereas when it slips into more kind of extreme behaviors, where I'm sacrificing, where I'm betraying myself in order to get that approval. - Can you, so give us an example of that? - So many different things. Like you're saying yes to things that are beyond your capacity without even checking it with yourself. If you can do it, you're sacrificing like your own life and your own wellbeing. Not just on like I'm working one late night or I'm working one two crazy weeks. It's like on a longer term basis, and you're consistently not doing it. - To regularly not coming home in order to make, do good, do right by your, not even do right by your bus. Do whatever needs to do to get your bus as approval, your sacrificing weekends, nights, family. - Yeah. - Again, as you said, not occasionally, but habitually. - Yeah. And over time, my experience has been that that's led for me to me feeling a lot of resentment. And then the accumulation of that, that's how you end up in burnout. It's like saying yes hundreds of times to things that you don't actually want to do. And then staying up late and taking on other people's work and managing other people's emotions. And I think a lot of people think of burnout as like, oh, I'm just like exhausted over time. When actually I think the difference between giving a lot of energy to your work versus burnout is burnout involves self-patrial. And so that's I think where the people pleasing, your like comes in is you're betraying yourself over and over and over again. And that is what actually compounds and leads to burnout. It's not just exhaustion. - I think we've talked about this before, but we had somebody on our team who burnt out and her workload was not enough to burn somebody out. And we couldn't understand it. And then I think we talked about it in a different capacity where she was an empathetic ear to a lot of people who were coming to her with all their problems, not just work problems. And her desire to please them and always be available to them, it got to the point where she, I mean, the whole thing collapsed. - Yeah. - She was exhausted, done. I mean, she quit her job, completely burned out. - Yeah, to me that like that screams like invisible self-patrails, like where you know in your system that you're betraying yourself over and over. - Because you don't want to let them down. - Yeah. - Oh, they're in pain, they're angry, they're sad. - Yeah. - You know, they need somebody to talk to. - Yeah, they-- - I don't want to upset them. - What I always think about is, you know, the game Jenga, where you stack the bricks, yeah. Like, it's like, if you're, if your sense of self is this Jenga and each time you betray yourself, you're like taking out one brick. - Great analogy. - You're taking out another brick, each time you say yes to something, each time you over-apologize, each time you rescue someone else 'cause they can't do the thing that they need to do. It's like brick, brick, brick, brick, brick, and then all of a sudden your whole life is unstable. - I think it's such a great analogy because we all do things that are slight betrayals but it's okay, it's healthy. Doing it occasionally, the Jenga stack is stable, even if you remove some bricks. What we're talking about, you know, the chronic people please are that that brick removal continues and continues and continues and, you know, it's healthy to take one piece out of the time, but eventually if it's habitual, you know, it has consequences and it's gonna collapse. - What about you, how do you feel like you've seen people pleasing to show up at work? - So I think, I know of one example, where somebody's a high performer, and they're highly competent, very good at what they do, and they've, I don't know where it comes from, but they have to communicate hyper-competence at all times to everyone. And so what they end up doing for fear of saying, I don't know, or fear of saying, I'm stretched too thin, or fear of saying, this is, I don't even know where to begin, they end up saying, yes to everyone, because they're maintaining, it's not just maintaining their view of themself of hyper-competence, but it's maintaining the image they've projected to everyone else of hyper-competence, and that's the pleasing part, which is, don't worry, I can take care of it, that's why you rely on me, 'cause I'm hyper-competent, and the problem is as they are. The problem is as they actually are, like is the incompetent ones that are people pleased as are easy? (laughing) Those are easy to spot, and we can rush in and help them and coach them. But I think the hyper-competent ones, and I know as for somebody who's had a hyper-competent people pleased or on my team, what ends up happening from the leadership standpoint, is we make it worse by accident, because they start to gain the reputation of being hyper-competent. So we start relying on them more, and I know, and I'm pretty good about sort of like people in balance, and I ask questions, expecting an honest answer. So I'll be like, "Hey, I got another thing for you, "do you have space on your plate?" I do. Are you sure? I just wanna make sure, yeah, yeah, yeah, no, it's good. And can you do this? I don't know if we've ever tried this before, but oh, no, no, no, I got this. So I am checking in, and they're lying to me. - Yeah, lying, lying is a strong word, but yeah. - Lying is a strong word. They're deceiving me and/or themselves. - Yeah. - The point is, is like even a well-intentioned leader who really wants to check in with somebody, make sure they have the bandwidth or the capacity, I can't help. - Yeah. - And so one of the things I wanna explore in our conversation is not only how does the people please are advocate in a way that doesn't disappoint or let anybody down, but helps them protect themselves, and, And how does a leader or a colleague who works with a people pleaser, how are we able to recognize the signals so that even if well-intentioned and asking questions that we can actually find out what's going on so that we can intervene, even if they say yes. So if they say yes, I can do it. And I go, you know what? Don't worry about it. I got this. It's so hard because the nature of it is very confusing to the people around you, because it feels authentically like, oh, they can take it on. Even though a small part of your intuition is like, we really don't think you can. And that's why you're checking, right? You're checking too, right? It's hard. What if you just doubt somebody who is competent? And so you and I have-- this has been our mantra since we started this, which is people are messy. This stuff is messy. Work is messy. This is messy. Yeah. None of this is crystal and clear. It's hard. Yeah. I think to your question of what was your first question? I just want to-- number one was, I want to-- how do we offer practical things to the people who are the people pleased is? But also, how do we offer practical things to people who work with people pleased? I think it's such a good point. And I think often, to your point, we're thinking about it in terms of the people who's are of what's going on in my system when I am saying, yes, it's like that I'm not a yes to. And I think the way trying to understand what are the different impacts that it has on the whole team or on our relationships is a totally other side of it. That I find to be really important because it goes against a lot of the things that the people please are internalized. For me, one of the greatest myths about people pleasing is that somehow it'll work. You really think it's going to work. And that's because in the short term, you get this hit of a good feeling. You say, yes, it's someone. And someone's like, thank you. Thank you so much. Oh, thank God you're on the team. Yeah, yeah. We are so comfortable. We're like, oh, please somebody is. And that's so and so. She's really like this. And so that, or in, let's say, your-- And that's the addiction part, right? That's the addiction. Yeah, let's say you're fearing the conflict. And that's the type that you are. In the moment, you do get to avoid the tense situation. It's like, oh, thank God it works. And then you're not thinking about the long-term impact. You're not thinking about the way that it's confusing other people. By the way, like any addict. Yeah. So it's very consistent. And what's so interesting is that you face those consequences every single time. My sister always asks this question, what's the mistake that you keep on making? Which I think is such an amazing question. Because we all have the mistakes that we keep on making. Even though we have to face the music after 10 and then after 10 days, after whatever it is, we still sometimes have to make the same mistakes over and over and over again. And so I think something that I have found a lot of solace in is reminding myself that I'm going-- future Alex is going to have to deal with this. And that it's also not just me. And that kind of makes me think about the other element, the other myth of people pleasing, which is that you're somehow doing it for other people. Oh, if I'm saying yes to something that you're asking me for, then I am a good person. I'm a good, generous, selfless person who's like sacrificing and there's a kind of moral righteousness to that. And we also associate, like if I'm saying no, that makes me bad. I'm not doing something that you want me to do that's bad. And that's selfish and ungenerous. And I think that internalized idea that when I'm saying yes to other people, it's about making their lives better. I actually want to kind of turn on its head. The way that I think about it is that it's actually paying a price of the truth so that you can soften your own discomfort. It's-- I mean, let's be very blunt and let's be harsh. And I say this with love. OK. What are you going to say? Not to you. But people pleasing, not making people pleased and not saying yes, but we talked about it as jenga. But the uncontrollable urge to keep pulling bricks out of the jenga pile, right? We're distinguishing between healthy pleasing and un-healthy. And I think you're saying this. I'm just going to be blunt about it. It's a selfish act, which is you're not doing it actually to serve the other person. You're doing it to either avoid the conflict or you're doing it to feel the little dopamine hit of well done. You know, it's actually not even dopamine. It's serotonin. But probably both, actually. But it's the desire for the approval that you become addicted to. And it is-- like any addiction, it is actually quite selfish. And this is what you're saying, I think, which is to turn it on its head and recognize that by saying yes constantly, though you're pleasing yourself in those moments. Yes, you hurt yourself over the course of time. But you're actually hurting and disappointing the other person as well that you're trying to please. Because now you have to unstick something or try and-- and the example you gave is from your own experience with somebody who said yes to something, miss the deadline, and then shut down and couldn't even respond to emails when people were like, hey, by the way, those are-- like, hey, I can help you. Like, if you haven't made the deadline, that's OK, we've got a whole team here, like, what's going on? But their ability to be like, I shouldn't have said yes, or I screwed up. Now there are ripples. There's now discontent. There's now the ripples of like, when you miss your deadline, it affects other people's deadlines. We're waiting on your work to do this work. And it's all because of-- and again, I'm exaggerating the point to make the point, but all because of the selfishness of the desire to get that approval and make somebody else happy in that moment, it actually becomes not the selfless act you think it is. I think I resonate with what you're trying to say. I think for me, labeling it as selfish, to me, activates like the shame part of my mind, which, for me, shuts down my capacity to engage with it in a self-contact-- I think that's being extreme at that point. To me, I'm trying to do something-- Well-intentioned. Well-intentioned. And the impact of it isn't what I think it is. And it's not-- I'm not trying to act out of self-interest. It's probably some protective thing from my childhood. Of probably some time in my childhood, I had to internalize that I couldn't both be myself and be safe and accepted by someone else. And so I picked being safe and accepted by someone else over-- There we go. There we go. Over. Staying true to what I know I'm going to need to-- That's a much better way of putting it. Thank you. You're right. And I think maybe if my instinct is, oh, I think I'm doing this for the other person, I find it helpful to turn that on its head and say, OK, if I think I'm doing this for the other person or for my team or for my boss or for whatever it is for my company, actually trying to show myself that it's not saying yes, that will be the best-- saying yes when I can't do something, it's not that that will be what's best for my team or for my boss or whoever it is. But actually saying the hard, harder, but truthful thing in this moment is in the long term, that's how I'm integrity to my team and to my boss and doing all these things. You know, maybe I am a people, please. I realize I've had to learn to say no, because I ended up hurting myself and others, because I just became unreliable. Don't give that to Simon. He's unreliable. And that didn't feel good. I got a feedback. Like, you're unre-- you know, we can't rely on you. And I was like, what? And it's because it wasn't because I'm irresponsible. It's because I said yes to too many things and couldn't do it all. And I've had to learn that saying no made me reliable. And I confused getting everything done as reliable. And rather, reliability is not the ability to execute everything. Reliability is accurately managing expectations. And I became more reliable when people like, we need this. And I'd be like, I can't. Or if I can, if I can take something else off my list. Yeah, it's also zooming out and being able to make sure. And now they get to decide with me if they really need me to do it, then we have to take something off the list. Or if somebody else can do it. Or it could maybe happen at another time. And I had to reconfigure what reliable means in my own head. And to be reliable, it means accurately managing expectations. By the way, saying no to everything is also unreliable. Because that's also-- You're not relying on it. But that's also not managing expectations, because I have to do something. So very interesting. Yeah. And it was never selfish when I said, yes, it was always well-intentioned. And sometimes an exaggerated sense of-- I mean, this is an exaggerated sense of what I'm capable of and of time. And it was not a conscious desire or ignorant. It was never ignorant. It was really well-intentioned. And sometimes forgetful of what else I've got going on. And I never said, let me check, which, by the way, is a viable answer. Can you do this? Let me check. Let me get back to you. And it was always a desire to be a great team player. So I guess I've never described myself as a people believe it, but I've definitely had elements of that. That I've worked very hard to work out, because I got negative feedback. Yeah. And I think tracking the long term impact of saying, yes, when you don't mean yes, is a good way to check in with yourself. It sounds like that's the journey that you are on. Is you were saying yes to all these things, then you weren't able to follow through, then you felt disappointed. Or I was putting myself in horrible positions where I'm just working too hard for fear of being unreliable. Yeah. And I think people who have the people pleasing to see, you can really recognize that of the intensity of the experience of being asked for something that you know you can't do, saying yes to it, then feeling self-loathing, then feeling-- then not being able to do it, then feeling ashamed that you're not able to do it, then feeling accountable, but also even then even more intense self-loathing, and then you're kind of just like in this spiral. And then you're fixating on all of these emotions that you're having instead of actually just doing the thing. It's a whole-- it's really a rabbit hole. And it really-- I have a lot of compassion for it. And I've done it a lot of times. The thing that I think is so interesting about people, please, is there's some deep sea childhood, like overbearing dad stuff, you know, like if she lit down her dad, you know, she was the worst person in the world and so I became that figure, that parent figure. And so I remember like when we would work together and she would show me stuff and I could, I would ask a question because it like it didn't add up, like it didn't make sense, like literally the math didn't make sense, you know, and I'd ask a question and she would lie to me. I mean she just flat out lie about what happened because for her telling the lie and being right was actually the better option than just saying I screwed up and fearing that she was letting me down. I would rather that and I'm like if you like I because once they sniff the lie I'm going to keep asking questions because it won't make sense and that's when it's going to feel stressful for you because I'm going to keep pummeling you with questions because it doesn't make sense, it's because you're lying and I remember once like I even remember where we were on a plane on a business trip together and like something didn't make sense, something wasn't aligning and I said what happened here and she like sort of like oh I screwed that up. I went okay well what's the right answer then she went I think it says I'm like okay great and for her to see like nothing happened. And very high performer there it's one of the reasons she was a high performer. I think that's a beautiful there's an idea that I'm obsessed with which is this idea of a positive corrective experience of when you have something that you think is going to go one way. Oh if I make a mistake, Simon will hit me forever and then instead of the worst fear being confirmed you have an opposite experience. It corrects your assumptions about what's going to happen in a positive way and it like rewire something in your system that's like oh I can make a mistake. That's what happened. Yeah. It didn't happen immediately but it didn't happen over the course of time. She had to dip her toe in the water and to discover and so like when we think about if you work with the people please. Exactly. Exactly. Right. And I remember because I couldn't just tell her. Like telling her isn't enough. Isn't enough and she wouldn't believe me. You know I'm like I wish you would believe you on a rational level but her something in her system would still fear it. Right. And so like even when we had the conversation more than once I'm like you got to just tell me and I'm cool with it. But you know but at some point I think I said you have to trust me. Just try it out. Yeah. Next time like just tell me what happened or tell me something went wrong or you made a mistake or you screwed up or you didn't know you needed help like any of those things and I want you to see how I will respond because I guarantee you it's different than what you're experiencing now because you feel unbelievable pressure now because the work is wrong and you're defending it and that's why there's a tension between us. You need to try it out. And she did and the first time it went okay and the second time it went okay and the third time it went okay and over a course of trials eventually she became very relaxing. Man, I screwed that up. It's such a beautiful thing and to me you executed it with so much love and grace and that's also like I when I you asked a question earlier of what do you do as a leader or as a team when you're working with someone who has this tendency and this is one of the things that I do is I try to create a positive corrective experience. I want to say that again because it's such a great phrase, a positive corrective experience. I like this idea of a positive corrective experience because corrective by itself sounds punitive. Like when you have anything corrected it's just like oh please you know but a positive corrective experiences which is I am correcting something here I'm correcting a behavior but it's going to be such a positive environment for you that you will find yourself craving it or at least being okay with it. I really love it and the way that I try to do it so for example my chief of staff who I adore and trust completely I love her so much. She also has this tendency and so whenever she's not communicating with me about something I know that something has happened and I'm trying to I'm trying to create the sense of safety so she knows that she can come to me and instead of withholding information out of fear she can be honest and so the way that I tried to craft this positive corrective experiences first I try to do what you did of tell her so on a conscious level she knows hey it's going to be okay I just really want to know I trust you and it's going to be okay but that like you said is kind of not enough and so then I try to give her some experience that allows her to feel in her system oh I have this fear that I'm going to be abandoned or I'm going to be rejected or I'm going to let someone down I'm going to disappoint them I'm going to have this fear and then instead of confirming the old fear the old belief then I give her this other experience and so that's a lived thing and then what I try to do is the thing that I would maybe add on is I try to name it so I try to be like I bet you thought that this was going to happen and now can you feel in your system that this other thing happened and then I try to offer this kind of over the long term. Two thoughts come to mind one is if we go back to the real experience you had of the person who was people pleasing and then then just started ignoring the emails yeah the problem is if you're the leader of the colleague and you get no response or not the response you need the emails become tercer and angrier yeah and now we're reinforcing the negative corrective experience. That's a negative corrective experience okay I screwed up but look how it's going so I'm certainly not going to admit anything could go ever wrong again. Well that does it just amplifies the shame and being stuck in the shame spiral is not going to help you get out of the behavior. And the other thing that I thought of when you're in the rational part where you're explaining something and I talk about this a lot because I love it which is the human brain cannot comprehend the negative right. I'll prove it to you ready ready. Don't think of an elephant right you can't tell the human brain not to do something. This is why they tell parents never tell your kids don't eat on the couch you say to your kids eat at the table you tell them the behavior you want not the behavior you don't want because all it does is reinforce the thing you don't want right and so when we say things like no you have to tell me the truth you won't get in trouble. All we're saying is you're going to get in trouble and so what we have to learn to say is no you have to tell me the truth I promise you it'll be a nice experience in a safe environment if you tell me. We have to tell them what they're going to get not what they're going to avoid so that's another thing that's really important to use affirmative language when having the rational conversation about consequences of the continued people please. I love that I've never heard that before. It's a good one. Okay now we've talked about the person leading the people pleaser a little bit. Let's talk about the people pleaser themselves. Can you please share some of the tricks and techniques that you teach to actually help the people pleasers? Okay there's so many that I love. One that I really love you kind of mentioned earlier which is let me get back to you. And so I think for people who are really trying to work on this behavior having a rule for themselves a challenge that whenever anyone asks them for anything they have to say let me get back to you. Even if they think that they're going to do it. No matter what. No matter what. Because it's a practice. It's a practice and it's building the muscle up. And you learn when to deploy it later but right now do it in extreme. Yes because the knee jerk answer is always yes you know and in the moment it feels like an authentic yes and so creating that a little bit of that distance of just for 24 hours or for two hours or whatever it is I'm going to actually check it with myself and I'm just going to see can I I'm going to check in with my students I'm going to look at my schedule I'm going to check in with someone else and see what I need to actually get the information that I need can I say yes to this another one that I'm obsessed with I call it sharing the dilemma maybe a bit different term for sharing the dilemma. Yeah because often when someone asks me for something I feel mixed right part of me wants to do it part of me knows I can't part of me thinks maybe I can if I do this thing and we often put ourselves in a position of needing to say yes or no when sometimes we can share something other than the yes or no and that can be true to our experience so there are many different ways to share the dilemma. One way is to share the context of okay I want to do this thing I'm also thinking about this these are the other competing priorities I have and so you can just share the context that's one another thing that you can do is you can share when you don't know because oftentimes when people are asking us for something and we don't actually know the answer I don't know if I can go to this event I don't know if I can take on this piece of work because of this thing then we don't answer and we fear we fear we either say yes or we don't answer instead of saying very simply like I don't know these are things that I'm waiting for let me get back to you and then the other thing that I like to do is I like to share the full like my full internal dilemma and it sounds kind of crazy but it really works because it creates a sense of like oh we're on the same team trying to figure this thing out together. Let me understand what you mean so I'll give you a real life example so go to a colleague maybe like I need you to do this. Okay so if I was trying to share the dilemma I would say okay great I really want to do this thing and this is my dilemma so these are the other things that I'm thinking about these are the other things that are on my plate and this is why those other things are important and so I try to show why they're important to remind that my teammate of oh our shared mission we're both trying to work on this big thing you have this one piece of it I have another piece of it so I try to share that I feel a yes to it I try to share kind of like the big picture the bird's-eye view of of the competing priorities and then I also try to acknowledge the other person's position or their needs so I'll be like I know this is important to you because you need this and this and this which also helps them feel like oh we're all on one team we're all in this dilemma together it's not like a kind of you versus me I'm going to either say yes and you're going to be happy with me or I'm going to say no and you're going to reject me and I'm not going to be worthy or useful and so I try to share kind of like the big picture view and it creates the sense of togetherness and also instead of being the end of a conversation like you asked me for something I say yes or I say no that's the end of the conversation when you share the dilemma it's the beginning of a dialogue of oh it's not that it ends here yes I'm doing it no I'm not it's okay interesting well maybe if I take on this piece of work, then you can do this. Oh cool, well I can do, what about these three things? If so and so can do this other thing. And so we're kind of sitting in the problem together, trying to figure it out together. And that is the beauty of sharing the dilemma. It starts a conversation, it starts a dialogue to find something that works for everyone. There's a nuance here that has to be underscored and it goes back to that affirmative language. So when somebody is sharing the dilemma, as I'm listening to you, that affirmative language really matters. So you don't want to say, you want to avoid saying, I don't want to say no. Right? Because now what the person who asks you just hears like, okay, you're about to, you're just telling me no. Right? I don't want to say no, but you know, I got this thing and this thing and this thing. That's actually not sharing the dilemma. That's not making the other people, the other person feel affirmed in asking for help. It would, sharing the dilemma, as I'm learning from you, I'm sort of gaming it out of my own head. I need you to do this. Ah, yes, that needs to get done. I'm working on this and I've got this. I'm trying to figure out how I can make time to prioritize that. So sharing the dilemma is literally that. It's the thinking out loud of trying to solve the problem that they're asking you to solve by moving to moving the pieces of the puzzle around. You're doing it out loud. That is sharing the dilemma. It is not. I want to say yes. You know, I want to make sure this happens, but you know, it's like, I don't want to say no. And it's not dumping your stuff on the other person's plate. It's literally them watching you process what you have to move around in your schedule or your day or your week to ensure that that thing that you think you agree is very important needs to get done. And simply sharing the dilemma, somebody else can say, oh, I didn't realize you were working on those things as well. Yeah, take that off your list and do this instead, or you know what? Continue what you're doing. I think it's easier if I do this myself. Yeah. And you never actually said yes or no. And this is what I think so valuable about the sharing the dilemma. It's not, I want to say yes or I don't want to say no. It's not saying yes or no. That's your very point. It is removing the binary nature of a question, can you do this? And it is literally going through the steps of trying to get to yes. We don't want to say, oh, I really want to help you, but this and this. I really want to help you. And these are the other things that I'm thinking of. So you're not. It's not negating. Yeah, you're not like fake saying I want to help you. It's like, yeah, I want to help you. And these are the other things that I'm thinking for. You're not saying, however, but except I have to think this is a nice trick because I do this as well, which is, I say to my team, I'm thinking out loud here. That's a different reason. It comes from people who think out loud. The addiction of thinking about it. No, no, no, it is, but people, especially in a position of authority, people take it as a task when it's just a thought. So I've had to learn to say I'm thinking out loud here is everybody puts their pens down, right? Everything's a muscle. So work the muscle by overdoing it in the short term. When sharing the dilemma, I think it's a great device to simply say, let me share the dilemma. Or even like, yeah, I'm in a little pickle. These are the things that I think. Yeah, pickle dilemmas like, I think the device of saying, yes, here's my dilemma. Yes, I'm in a bit of a pickle is a nice way to get somebody to say it the right way and get it out. I love that. Yeah. What else? This is so good. Another one that I love. Okay. Have you heard of the term villain era? villain era or ERA or ERA ERA. villain era. Yeah. Like the era. It's like a modern term. No, I don't know the term villain era. It's like when you're a is not an album by Taylor Swift. Maybe that's too out of me. I want to have one of her errors. So have you heard of the term villain era? I have not. Is this modern slang? Is this about to make me feel old? It's probably going to make me feel. Maybe it's on fleek. Wait, that's all. I wouldn't go that's all right. Okay, so a villain era is like a modern term. Yeah. And it's basically when you move from being overly accommodating like nice to everyone, people pleasing, prioritizing everyone else's needs over your own to like I'm prioritizing myself and I'm not going to say yes to things that I'm not yes to. So basically you're you're handing in your wings and your halo and you're trying out the horns for size. Exactly. You get it. And I'm like I like the wings and the halo but let me just see what this little pitchfork and horns are like. So it's trying out the other. Yes. But the reason it's called the villain era is because to everyone else in your life who's used to you being overly accommodating and kind of a pushover and being able all of a sudden that those things have changed. Like we change our behaviors but our relationships need to catch up with us. And so this is another thing that I think about is like what especially if you have like a chronic people pleasing situation whether it's people in your life or people at work they're used to interacting with you in a certain way. Right. And so when we decide internally that we want to change that it takes other people time to catch up and that reaction can feel quite intense and that change can be quite surprising to people. And so I think the mistake. So you're advocating for villain errors or you're not advocating for villain errors. I'm advocating for two things. First of all when you make a big change that's going to impact your dynamics of other people I like to name it. Like hey I'm really working on. Do you have to tell people? I like to tell people that way they know what's going on and also maybe they'll even be on my team. Because otherwise you're going to start acting differently and people are going to be like what the hell. Yeah. And now they label you the villain. Exactly. Yeah. So I try to name it and in a way that like hopefully inspires people to want to be on my team with me. For me, let's say it's my boss or let's say it's a friend of mine or my partner. Probably they know they're feeling the long term impact of my people pleasing. And so I can maybe tell them like hey just want to let you know that I'm working on this. I'm trying not to say yes to things that I don't actually have capacity for or I'm trying to be more authentic like will you support me in this. And what you maybe will you check with me when I say yes to something will you check and say, "Are you sure? Are you sure you actually want to go to that thing?" So I try to name that I'm changing the behavior and I try to do it in a way that is with warmth rather than harshness. I think when people first start setting boundaries or standing up for themselves, they're so worried that they won't be able to do it, that they're overly firm and they're overly cold. And that is really freaky to people and that also creates negative corrective experiences. And so I think especially when you're starting out or when I'm starting out, I'm setting a new boundary for the first time. Something that I like to do is set it with warmth. The thing, okay here's what I'm taking from this. Yeah, that's really. That I really like. So we've got three things. We've got, let me get back to you. We've got, I want to share the dilemma or share the dilemma. And what I'm hearing this one, which I really, really like, this plays to all my biases, which is asking for help and letting others be a part of it. Because I think one of the things that we're setting up people pleasers to fail is that they have to master all of these techniques that we're talking about all by themselves in order to overcome their people pleasing. And part of it is actually, that's not true and that's not possible. And I think saying to a colleague or a boss or whoever to just be open and say, I know something about myself that I'm not proud of, but it is what it is, which is I'm a people pleaser. And I know that in the short term, it feels good for you and for me. And I know over the long term, it hurts me and it probably hurts my work product. And so I'm really working to get over it. Here are the techniques that I'm going to be practicing. One, I'm going to start saying, let me get back to you when you ask me to do things. Sometimes it'll only take 10 minutes or an hour, you know, but it's one of the techniques I'm practicing. The other one is, I'm going to share the dilemma when you ask me to do things. And if I forget, can you please remind me? So for example, if you come to me and say, I need you to do this and I very quickly go, yes, it's because I forgot. Can you say, do you want to think about this before you get back to me? Yeah. Or if I say, let me get back to you and I come back with this, it's like, do you want to share the dilemma with me? So I think getting the your colleague, your boss, whoever to be a part of it is very reinforcing of the positive, corrective environment. But also it builds trust and collegiality between the two of you, which is only a good thing. And I really like that. And it makes the other person complicit in your success. Yeah. I love the way you put it, it's building trust, because I think often the people, please, those experience is this intense loss of trust, loss of trust with themselves. And also the feeling backed into a corner where they know that they're hurting the trust that someone else has given them, but they kind of don't know what to do about it. People pleasing isn't just my problem. Yeah. We all have our issues, you know. How do we all help each other with our issues? Which I love. Me too. Because you know my definition of a healthy corporate culture is when everybody agrees to grow together. And so a healthy corporate culture is when we agree to grow together. Before we end, I just thought of one other technique that has really helped me. And it's a, it's, I'm going to try and make up a term like your positive corrective environment, which is affirmative deadline adjustment. Affirmative deadline adjustment. Yeah, or ADA. Nothing like a good TIO. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Three better acronym. Yeah. So affirmative deadline adjustment. So I'll give you real life scenario. He's timing, can you do this? Yes. I need by Friday. No problem. Okay. And then I'm going nuts trying to get it done by Friday. And then I'm either successful at great personal cost or I'm about to fail. And I call them be like, I can't, do this by Friday and it's probably Friday morning. I can't do this today and they're like, let's find anytime next week we'll do. And you realize when you say when do you need it by, people just make shit up. - Everything in working is made up. - It's like when do you need this by Friday? Okay, you know? And so what I've learned is if they don't give me a deadline, I know my own schedule, let me get back to you and say, can I get this to you next Friday? Yeah, that's no problem. Oh, can you do next Thursday? Yes, yes I can do. Or when they say, when do you need by Friday? Is next Tuesday okay? Yeah, next Tuesday's fine. And I found out that very few deadlines that I was given are actually deadlines of which there are repercussions if that deadline is missed. And most of them just needed to be done by a certain period of time. And simply asking, is it okay if I do then, almost always, it went my way. And so that's another little trick, which is affirmative deadline adjustment. - Yeah, or whatever. - It's so good. (laughing) - And it's also the opposite of what's normally happening, which is like, oh, I'm like, that whole world is caving in on me. - Well, you just assume that whatever you're being told is like the thing. And there's also a terrible technique, which a lot of leaders have learned, and I wish they would do a way with it, which is giving people fake deadlines. Well, if I give them a fake deadline, that way it'll get done on time. And if they miss it, well, it's okay, we're taken care of. Because the minute you figure out all the deadlines are fake, then I miss all the deadlines because they're all fake anyway. You know, my publisher learned this the hard way. They used to always give me fake deadlines, and I just started ignoring all their deadlines because they were all fake anyway. And I would tell them, tell me the absolute gods on this truth deadline, 'cause then I know there were serious consequences if I miss it, and I'm gonna hit the deadline because there's serious consequences. So, anyway, different conversation. (laughing) - Are there any other tips for people pleasing, either for the people who use themselves or for people who are keeping the book? - I think this is a good list. I think what we have is a good list. I'm gonna just review. Let me get back to you, done in the extreme to start, and then you'll habituate it. To is, let me share the dilemma, or share the dilemma, which I think is wonderful. The third one was-- - Like asking someone for support. - Oh, asking the third one was asking for support and getting help in what you're working on. And the fourth one is, confirm the deadlines. - Yeah. - Confirm the deadline. Don't just take it for granted that whatever the deadline is, is actually the deadline. - Yeah. - Or the workload or whatever it is. Confirm the thing that needs to be done. - One that I would add, I kind of started it, but I didn't just go back to it is, when we start setting boundaries and saying no, when we start, we're often do it with this really intense firmness and harshness and coldness. Like we like steal ourselves up because we think that if we're firm, the other person won't push back. And we think if they push back a little bit, I'm in a crumble, 'cause I know that I'm new to this. And so we like, we're like overly firm and aggressive sometimes, or overly mean, because we just think that that's what we need to do. We think that that's what boundaries are. And I would say you can still be firm while also being warm and while also staying in connection. - This is a very, very, very important point, especially younger generations who are learning about boundaries and boundaries setting. They falsely believe that having a boundary is simply saying no to everything. - Yeah. - And there's no quicker way to disengreciate yourself on a team than saying, these are my boundaries and that's not a team player. And every technique that we are going through today is boundary setting, because you are now taking some agency into your own workload. The expectations others have of you. The expectations you have of yourself, and you're learning to adjust them in a way that helps you work to your natural best and it manages the expectations of the people with whom you work. That is what healthy boundary setting is. Everything we're talking about today is healthy boundary setting in a way that is constructive to the team. Simply saying, I have boundaries, the answers know, that's you operating like an island, forgetting the fact that there are other people here. And just as it is not a good idea to miss deadlines 'cause there are implications, it's also not a good idea to simply start arbitrarily saying no to things because there are things happening that you don't know about. So this is a very, very, very important point that we're making here. These are boundary setting things that we're talking about. They're being done in an extremely affirmative and team oriented way. Okay, are there any other strategies or things? - I learned this from the Air Force. In private sector, this is a normal scenario. Somebody works really, really hard on their PowerPoint presentation. They work two weeks on it, and they have the big meeting, and they do their presentation, and at the end they go, "Huh? "Huh? Pretty good, right?" Like that's fairly normal in private sector. In the Air Force, it's totally different. Somebody will work really, really hard on their PowerPoint presentation. They'll come in to the meeting, they'll give their presentation, and at the end they go, "Spheres? "Spheres?" At the end of their work, they ask for the room to throw spears at the work to make the work better. - Well, I love that. - It is fantastic. And so now in our office, it's very normal. It's completely acculturated at our office where somebody will present their work and at the end they'll say, "Spheres?" Or somebody will just share an idea and be like, "Here's an idea, a spear." Or somebody will say, "I got a spear for you." And we now have this very relaxed feedback loop where we don't sort of give excessive amounts of praise unnecessarily just to make somebody feel good. Everybody actually wants the spears, and the reason is we recognize we're all working in this together, everybody wants everybody's work to be the best it can be, and we're all in this together. It's always done with love, right? The spears. And they're always warmly received. What I've learned from one of the people pleases on my team is that this culture of spears has allowed them to experience getting negative feedback and not feel bad. - Yeah. - And the stakes are low, right? - It's like exposure therapy. - It's exposure therapy. And especially because we're all really good about, instead of just saying, "That's dumb." We go, "I got a spear for you." They're like, "Okay, bring it on." So it sets the, and everybody sees the meetings. Like everybody's like, "Yeah, good spear, good spear." And so all this negative feedback that's being thrown at the work, people are seeing, "We're not attacking you." - Yeah, it's like oriented towards growth. - We're helping the work. It's always at the work, it's never at you, because I think people pleasers very often confuse that the criticism of the work is criticism of me. It's not, it's of the work. And spears clarifies that. - I love that. - Yeah, it's great. There's five techniques. - Okay. - One, first one is, - Let me get back to you. - Let me get back to you, work the muscle, work it a lot at the beginning. Number two, share the dilemma. Number three, ask for help. - Yeah, tell someone your behavior is gonna change and to support you and even sometimes prompt you with seeing number one and two. - Yes. (laughs) - Number four. - Affirmative, deadline, a dozen. I really well named. - It's terrible, is it? - Behavior. - Okay, let's just call it like, check the deadline. Number four, check the deadline and number five, - Spears. - Ask for spears. - Proactively ask for spears. - Or if you're in a position of influence or authority, introduce spears into the company, 'cause you not only will help with feedback, but you're helping all your people pleases on the team too. - Oh, I love it. - But more importantly than us feeling pleased, I really hope that everybody's listening is feeling pleased. - Until next time. - Until next time. - Right. Thank you, sir. - Thank you, Alex. (soft music) - A bit of optimism is a production of the optimism company, lovingly produced by our team, Lindsay Garbenius, Phoebe Bradford and Devon Johnson. Subscribe wherever you enjoy listening to podcasts and if you want even more cool stuff, visit SimonCenegam.com. Thanks for listening. Take care of yourself. Take care of each other.