Is It Kindness or People Pleasing? The Difference May Surprise You

For a long time, I thought I was just a generous woman.

I had a big heart.

I showed up.

I helped.

I gave people the benefit of the doubt long after the doubt had started making more sense than the benefit.

I was the woman people could call when they needed money, encouragement, a favor, a place to land, or somebody to make their problem feel less heavy.

And I took pride in that.

What I didn’t understand was that not all of my giving came from kindness.

Some of it came from fear.

Some of it came from guilt.

Some of it came from needing to feel useful because usefulness was where I had placed my value.

That was difficult for me to admit.

Calling myself kind felt good.

Calling myself a people pleaser meant I had to look at what was really happening underneath all that giving.

People pleasing isn’t a clinical diagnosis.

It’s a common name for a pattern where we repeatedly put someone else’s comfort, needs, opinions, or approval ahead of our own.

It can look generous from the outside. Inside, though, it may feel like we don’t have a real choice.

We say yes quickly and regret it later.

We apologize for having needs.

We read the room before we read ourselves.

We notice a change in someone’s tone and immediately wonder what we did wrong.

We hint instead of asking directly because asking directly might give someone the chance to say no.

We become so good at adjusting to everybody else that we slowly lose touch with what we actually think, want, and feel.

That isn’t the same thing as being caring.

Kindness has room for choice.

People pleasing often feels like an emotional requirement.

I used to be a people pleaser, and it was bad.

My value was tied to how much I could do for people.

I put certain people on pedestals, and every time I placed somebody above me, I quietly placed myself below them.

Then I operated from that position.

Their needs felt more important.

Their disappointment felt more dangerous.

Their approval felt like proof that I mattered.

I wasn’t always giving because I wanted to.

Sometimes I was giving because I was afraid of what would happen if I stopped.

Would they still call?

Would they still love me?

Would they think I was selfish?

Would they become angry, distant, or cold?

Would I still have a place in their life if I was no longer making their life easier?

That’s the part we don’t always want to say out loud.

Sometimes being needed can feel a lot like being loved, especially when we learned early that being agreeable, helpful, quiet, or easy to manage kept our relationships steady.

And for many women, that training starts long before we’re old enough to understand what’s happening.

We’re praised for being sweet.

For cooperating.

For not talking back.

For helping without being asked.

For making other people comfortable.

By adulthood, many of us have been practicing this for years.

In a YouGov survey, 56 percent of women described themselves as people pleasers, compared with 42 percent of men.

Women were also more likely to say that being this way had made their lives harder.

That doesn’t mean every helpful woman is secretly afraid.

It doesn’t mean generosity is unhealthy.

It means we have to tell the truth about what’s driving ours.

Am I helping because I freely want to?

Or am I helping because saying no makes me afraid of who I might lose?

That question changed a lot for me. 

When I finally started saying no, I expected to feel strong and relieved.

Sometimes I did.

Other times I felt guilty.

Selfish.

Mean.

I wanted to explain myself until the other person agreed that my boundary was reasonable.

I wanted permission to choose myself from the very people who benefited when I didn’t.

But we can’t ask someone who is comfortable with our lack of boundaries to approve of the boundary that changes their access to us.

Some people will understand.

Some people will adjust.

And some people will show us that what they appreciated wasn’t our heart.

It was our availability.

That truth can hurt.

I’ve been used emotionally and financially.

I’ve given from places in me that were already empty.

I’ve shown up for people who had very little interest in how showing up was costing me.

There comes a point when calling that kindness becomes dishonest.

Kindness shouldn’t require us to abandon ourselves.

Love shouldn’t depend on how exhausted we’re willing to become.

And being a good woman shouldn’t mean everybody gets access to our time, money, energy, attention, and emotional strength.

Now, before I agree to something, I try to ask myself a better question.

Do I have the capacity for this?

Do I have the emotional capacity?

The mental capacity?

The spiritual capacity?

The financial capacity?

Because wanting to help and being able to help aren’t always the same thing.

Sometimes the honest answer is no.

That no may disappoint someone.

It may change how they see us.

It may even expose a relationship that only worked because we were always the one giving.

We have to let that information matter.

There’s a difference between selfishness that harms other people and the kind of self-consideration that keeps us from harming ourselves.

Choosing ourselves in a moment doesn’t erase our goodness.

Protecting what we need to live doesn’t make us cold.

It makes our kindness honest.

It means our yes can finally mean yes because no is also available.

That’s what I’m learning now.

I don’t want to be generous because I’m scared not to be.

I don’t want to be loved only when I’m useful.

I don’t want to keep giving to people who believe my heart is an endless resource they never have to help refill.

I still care deeply.

I still show up.

But now I’m learning to notice whether I’m giving from love or giving from fear.

They can look exactly the same from across the room.

Inside us, they feel completely different.

#EvolvingWomanhood