How to Help Children Break People-Pleasing Habits
Think of a time in your life when you agreed to do something even though you really didn’t want to. Maybe it was saying yes to taking on even more tasks at work. Maybe it was cramming another child into your packed schedule because they needed urgent help. Maybe it was even something trivial, like agreeing to do the grocery shop on your way home even though you had the worst day and just wanted to chill out.
Our young clients, no matter what age they are, have gone through this too. It’s relatable for just about everyone. And we know how we feel afterwards. Like we’re a pushover. Like we’re incapable of saying the word ‘no’. Like we’re a doormat for people to walk all over.
And like a doormat, we just don’t speak up.
Our desire to make other people happy – people-pleasing – ends up making us unhappy.
Encountering a people-pleaser in your practice is highly likely. Here’s what to look for.
The Types of People-Pleasers You’ll Meet in Your Practice
1. The Best Friend
Matthew* wanted to be the best friend he could be. Matthew* had a lot of friends, understandably. He was a nice kid, popular, and always ready to help. And he had friends who exploited that. Matthew* was always being asked to share his homework, which he diligently completed every day. Scared to say no and worried that rejecting the requests would alienate him from his friends, he handed over his homework each and every time. He felt annoyed and taken advantage of, something he only ever shared with me, his therapist. He could never dream of saying it to his friends.
His resentment grew and grew with every request for his homework but he never said no, out of fear of being cast out by his friend group. Matthew* couldn’t see the problems he was causing by always saying yes. His friends’ grades started slipping because they didn’t understand the work, something that would be helped by completing their own homework. But he was happy, as long as his friends kept hanging out with him, even if it meant he was being used.
2. The Perfect Student
Alana* was the portrait of a perfect student. Her grades were fantastic, she was always on time for class, she went above and beyond with all her projects and she could always be relied on to have her hand in the air, ready to answer any question her teachers asked. Her report cards were always glowing, raving about how amazing she was. She would stay behind during lunch breaks to help clean up the mess her peers had made, since her workspace was, of course, flawless.
Alana* came to me because she was struggling with anxiety. This perfectionism, driven by her desire to please her teachers, resulted in her neglecting her own needs and interests. She would rather be hanging out with her friends during lunch hour, not tidying up after her messy classmates. She just wished her teacher would say something like “Oh no, Alana*, you go outside and relax. I’ll make the messy kids stay behind next time.” But her teacher never did, so she kept helping out. She loved getting her report cards that talked about how helpful and kind she is. When her teacher seemed to be in a bad mood, she would spend the whole day worrying what she had done wrong.
3. The Most Helpful Kid
Felicity* was often called ‘an old soul’ or ‘wise beyond her years’. She liked the compliment and understood that she received it because she was so helpful at home, just like an adult. She knew how hard her parents worked, late hours, coming home exhausted, so she stepped up to help with her siblings wherever possible. This took the form of some extra household chores, playing with her younger siblings, and getting dinner on the go with the parts she was able to do, like washing up dirty pots that would be used. Sometimes her mother would tell her that she’s a ‘natural’ when it comes to parenting and it would make her feel so proud.
When her siblings would fight, Felicity* stepped in as mediator. Her parents would lavish her with praise when she helped, but after some time passed, they started taking her help for granted. They would snap at her if she didn’t mediate a fight that the smaller siblings were having. Her parents would complain about dinner only being ready later since they had to do the dishes first because Felicity* couldn’t get to them in time. Comments like this made her really angry. She did the dishes 90% of the time, but some days she had extra homework that needed to get done first. She felt like she wasn’t appreciated and her resentment grew as a result. She was brought to therapy because she had started to seem ‘sullen’ to her parents.
The High Cost of People-Pleasing
People-pleasing leads to a loss of self-respect and self-worth. Children, teens and adults who put the needs of others ahead of their own time and time again start to feel invisible and undervalued, leading to emotional issues like sadness, resentment or anxiety. Their self-esteem starts to become contingent on the opinions of those they are trying to please, and when positive affirmations dry up, as they inevitably do, people-pleasers spiral emotionally.
Constantly seeking approval from others and trying to limit discomfort or prevent conflict in other people can cause more problems. It hinders the ability to develop a strong sense of self and independence, since so much self-regard is contingent on the feedback of others.
People-pleasing comes at a high cost. It can even result in being respected less by those they are trying to please because there are no boundaries in place.
Learning to Say No
As therapists, we know the importance of saying no, even if we sometimes struggle with it ourselves. Saying no is an assertion of self-respect that recognizes that our time and energy belong to us just as much as it belongs to others. Saying no doesn’t mean that we will never care for others or put their needs above our own.
Saying no means we find a balance between the needs of others and what we need.
Setting boundaries is a crucial skill that needs to be learned in order to help our young clients communicate to others that their own needs and priorities matter too. They might feel like this is selfish. To someone who has deeply entrenched people-pleasing habits, this is likely going to feel very selfish at the start. Our job is help them see that it isn’t selfish to care for oneself. It’s about self-preservation and developing a healthy and very necessary sense of self-worth.
Breaking the habit of people-pleasing isn’t easy but it’s crucial for emotional well-being, no matter how old you are. By teaching our young clients to set boundaries and advocate for themselves, we instil skills that will set them up for success throughout their lives. Making others happy is important, but making ourselves happy matters just as much.
We have developed several worksheets, available in the kits in our shop (https://mindfulkids.io/shop/) that help children learn to say ‘no’. Together with resources like positive affirmations worksheets (PDF) or activities to help change negative thoughts into positive thoughts, we’ve got your back. We’ve created plenty of cognitive behavioural therapy workbooks including mindfulness techniques for teenagers and children.
