SERIES - People-pleasers always want to please others. How to finally make room for your own needs

Your colleague is leaning in the doorway of the office and raving about his new steamer. The question of whether preparing food is of interest to the person opposite you at this moment is obviously not on his mind. You actually wanted to work, but your colleague is just getting going. So what should you do? Protect your precious time? Or continue to nod politely in the hope that he will finish on his own?

A classic dilemma. If you want to please everyone, you often betray yourself and your limits. If you say no, you disappoint expectations and risk people turning away. Both options lead to an undesirable situation.

Many people in such a dilemma decide to maintain harmony and later know everything about steam cooking but nothing about how to structure their presentation. The fear of offending someone and being rejected as a result is deep-seated. As social beings, we strive to be agreeable, cooperative and sociable.

People who want to please the other person at all costs and who constantly put their own needs aside are called people-pleasers. The term comes from the Anglo-American language and has become very popular in popular psychological self-help literature.

Even though people-pleasing is not an official diagnosis that appears in the index of standard psychological texts, psychologists are aware of the pitfalls of a lack of differentiation.

"These people are in danger of being overrun and not being heard," says Alexander Grob. The professor of developmental and personality psychology at the University of Basel knows how important the topic of "setting boundaries" is for human identity development.

And he says: "In order to be able to set boundaries, I first have to know where my boundaries lie." Why do some people recognize this more easily than others? It also has to do with childhood. Those who experience early on that basic needs such as peace, privacy or autonomy are satisfied find it easier to stand up for themselves later on.

On the other hand, children whose needs have been neglected, shamed or punished have a harder time. They gradually learn to suppress their needs. According to Alexander Grob, it is more difficult for them to sense what they need in adulthood.

A fictitious example: Julia, a young working woman, has had a hard day at work and is feeling exhausted. Her mother calls and immediately starts talking about her own problems without asking how Julia is. She expects Julia to listen to her and provide her with emotional support. But Julia would like to rest. Although she tries to end the conversation politely, her mother continues talking.

When Julia clearly announces that she is going to hang up and rest, her mother reacts reproachfully. She accuses her daughter of only thinking about herself and not being interested in the family. When the phone call is over, Julia feels guilty. Did she have the right to articulate her needs?

"Having a bad feeling doesn't always mean that you've made the wrong decision," says Alexander Grob. He often comes across this fallacy. Every fundamental and deep development is accompanied by ambivalent feelings. The sooner those affected accept this, the easier it is for them to endure unpleasant feelings - such as guilt.

Anyone who has ever tried to break old patterns knows how unfair it can feel not only to disappoint other people but also to be plagued by feelings of guilt. Perfectionists in particular have a hard time dealing with this, says Alexander Grob. Their mantra is to meet all expectations.

It is not surprising that people-pleasers want to avoid this emotional chaos and prefer to adapt. But that comes at a price: Anyone who systematically ignores their need for peace, self-determination and closeness or distance will eventually feel burned out and overwhelmed.

Instead of consciously setting boundaries and standing up for their needs, those affected accept unpleasant situations and thus maneuver themselves into complete exhaustion over the years. So where is the way out? "When in doubt, always go straight through the emotions," says Alexander Grob.

So should you just put up with feelings of guilt? "In such moments, it can help to remember which need you protected with your no," says Alexander Grob. In the fictitious example, Julia, the working daughter, wanted to protect her desire for peace and quiet. A legitimate need.

Those who stand up for their own needs benefit. Two American psychologists also recognized this in the 1950s. The researchers Joseph Wolpe and Andrew Salter developed a technique that was supposed to help people stand up for themselves without fear: This was the birth of the so-called Assertiveness Training Program - ATP for short.

This training concept helps people to strengthen their self-confidence. The German psychologists Rüdiger Ullrich and Rita Ullrich-de Muynck further developed and fine-tuned the original ATP concept in the 1970s.

To combat the subjects' insecurity, the researchers came up with 127 socially challenging situations that they had to practice in role plays. They were then asked to implement the tasks in everyday life.

Exercise situation number 1 does not seem very challenging: it requires the participants to ask a friendly-looking passerby for directions without any submissive gestures.

But the level of difficulty gradually increases. In exercise 45, you enter a fancy shoe store, try on different models and leave the store without buying anything. Exercise 48 involves asking a person at the checkout to let you go ahead of you. In exercise 125, you have to recognize and address manipulative behavior. The program also includes asking seemingly stupid questions, reacting to pushy behavior or expressing your own opinion in public.

Roughly speaking, the exercises cover the following types of social skills: making demands, saying no and criticizing, establishing contacts, exposing oneself to public attention and allowing oneself to make mistakes.

The participants should learn to endure when others criticize them or when they themselves make mistakes. They learn that it is possible to express their own needs and make demands. And they learn to set boundaries without fearing rejection. All of this requires practice.

But as with any training, there is a risk of overshooting the mark, says Alexander Grob. Especially at the beginning.

People who find it difficult to set boundaries tend to be overly harsh and unfriendly when they do, explains the psychologist. But those who shout at the other person or even break off contact completely are depriving themselves of many opportunities.

Firstly, the willingness of those who are harshly reprimanded to respect boundaries decreases. And secondly, the danger increases for those who set the boundaries of later beating themselves. Sometimes they then try to make up for the outburst of anger by being particularly lenient and mild.

Alexander Grob recommends something different: If you want to learn to set boundaries in the long term, you should try to be friendly in tone but firm in the matter. "We should also be guided by the idea that not everyone intentionally violates our boundaries," he says. Because rarely do all parties want the same thing at the same time. One wants peace and quiet, the other wants closeness. "Then we may have a conflict of needs, but we still like each other," he says, adding: "If I say yes to myself and politely say no to the other person, then that should be accepted."

Feelings of guilt and fear are part of the experience when you start to set boundaries. But they will diminish over time. And that is a perspective. Because the alternative is far less attractive. Anyone who doesn't set boundaries is still constantly saying no: to themselves.

An article from the « NZZ am Sonntag »