I once heard someone say, “We teach people how to treat us” and this comment resonated deeply within me. It enabled me to begin to understand how I’ve allowed certain people to treat me. In these relationships I have been left feeling hurt and unloved because I haven’t told them that their behaviour towards me is unacceptable but the more work I do on myself around having stronger personal boundaries and around increasing the value of my self-esteem and my self-worth, these behaviours are no longer tolerable and I’m prepared to use my voice to let these individuals know that. This goes hand in hand with why I absolutely love the magic of the healing and meditation work that I share with my clients, with all the shifts and changes they experience with their own self-esteem and self-worth, as much as the magic I experience through diving ever deeper on my own healing path.

So, that said, let’s dive in more fully with looking at how many of us are people pleasers and why, in truth, our voices matter…

People pleasing

Hands up, full disclosure, I avoid conflict wherever possible. It’s one of my learnt behaviours and it certainly does not serve me on every level because sometimes conflict can be a healthy way to resolve situations.

When I was in my twenties, house sharing in London, I remember a young girl bragging about how she and her soon-to-be husband never argued. Even then I thought, oh my, that doesn’t sound healthy! At the other end of the pendulum swing, my mother used to wait for an audience before picking a fight which was never pretty but it does also explain my aversion to conflict.

Finding your true essence

So as I move ever further along my own healing journey I am learning what does and does not serve me in the ways I behave and I’ve been observing my role as the people pleaser, the one that puts other people’s needs before my own. When you heal the root cause of what has been triggering you, you will step ever more fully into your true essence which in turn will enable you to be more of who you came here to be. Those closest to us are there to mirror and trigger us for our own personal growth and development as we are for them too.

Very generally speaking, those of us that are people pleasers have learnt to be so because we want to be liked or loved by others; we have poor or no boundaries, enabling others to walk all over us. These are most often our learnt behaviours from abusive relationships when we were young and were put into play to keep us safe, but we have outgrown their use while failing to let them go. We fear rejection and often seek external validation. These are not easy behaviours to shift because we often do not even recognise that we are allowing them to run the show. In becoming aware of them, we can begin to observe our actions and then we can start to modify them and let them go.

Putting the needs of others above your own

People pleasers often put the needs and emotions of others over and above their own needs, which is detrimental to their own wellbeing. If you continue to neglect your own wellbeing you begin to create co-dependent relationships with others. This in turn deepens the fear of conflict that I mentioned earlier. We also constantly compromise our own values and needs in order to keep the peace, to avoid any form of conflict with others and in order to avoid any form of disagreement at all costs. It is exhausting and over time it creates a loop of resentment, deepening into the sense of a lack of self-esteem, self-worth and self-confidence.

Seeking validation from others

People pleasers seek approval from external sources, seeking validation from others, and are often desperate to be liked and/or loved. When I first moved to Australia I joined my street book club, returning home from my first outing in tears, telling my husband that nobody liked me. Luckily I can now laugh at myself but at the time I was in complete despair. I’m delighted to say that I no longer care whether people like me or not; I’m me and I’ve finally learnt to love myself. You can take me or leave me; this is who I am.

I’ve recently been diving ever deeper into my understanding of my own learnt behaviours with regards to being a people pleaser. I’ve been delving into the pains and hurts that I have buried deep within my energy system that have been bubbling to the surface wanting to be acknowledged, healed and released. Please note that if you too are a people pleaser, you may have masked your behaviours in different ways – I am only sharing my behaviour to assist you in diving deeper too and to help you question how you mask your pains and hurts so that you can also choose to acknowledge them and let them go in order to heal.

Buried patterns

I have discovered that my deeply buried patterns of being a people pleaser are, as previously mentioned, that I avoid conflict at all costs. When I’m close to others in conflict, even when I’m just an observer, I can feel the negative energy moving through my solar plexus and I move myself out of harm’s way. I have also masked my true feelings of discomfort by being cheerful, which in turn masked my ability to trust myself because I wasn’t able to access my true feelings. I therefore didn’t always trust my feelings and my instinct because I had taught myself to override both of them. Furthermore, this behaviour impacted my confidence, spiralling at some point into despair.

All in all, I realised that as I mask my pains and hurt with a smile, I bury my painful emotions ever deeper in order to make others feel comfortable. And as I don’t speak up for myself, as I don’t speak my truth, I energetically give away my personal power to keep the peace, making others right and myself wrong. This becomes a continual loop of negative behaviour of the self.

Finding your own voice

It is time for each and every one of us to find our own unique and beautiful voice. We are all here for a reason, we are all part of the divine plan with something wonderful to offer the whole. So I know it is time for me too to fully learn to let go of all the above negative attributes of being a people pleaser to know and understand that my voice matters and to use it for the greatest good.

To this end I recently attended a workshop called Voice Activation. It was only a two-hour affair but I found my golden nugget of wisdom to take away. I’m very aware of the benefits of the frequency of sound to assist in releasing energy blocks and over the years I’ve attended various forms of voice activation workshops but the golden nugget at this particular workshop was the idea that we can use the song ‘Do-Rei-Me’ to clear and active our chakras.

As we chanted each sound together I could feel the vibrations move through me and the deeper we went, I could see and feel the colours of each chakra. It was truly amazing and I felt something deep within me had shifted once we finished. Since then, I’ve received even more clarity and I feel more confident in the path I’m choosing to walk. Things are beginning to fall into place and I’m loving it. I’m able to speak more openly and more honestly about how I’m truly feeling. I’m able to speak from my heart, knowing that my voice matters.

Healing and Meditation

Your voice matters too! What truths are you needing and wanting to speak? Owning your own voice is a vital part of the healing process, both for your communication with others and also for your soul’s journey.

I hope that what I have shared with you helps you and makes you want to know yourself at the level of your beautiful, wise and shining heart and that it helps you to navigate through your daily life with grace and ease. Remember that healing and meditation are excellent ways to assist you in letting go of old learnt behaviours and limiting beliefs, assisting you with stepping ever more fully into all that you truly are. Enabling you to soften, open and expand your heart space, learning to know yourself on a soul level.

Please do get in touch if you have any questions or if you’d like my support. I’d love to assist you on your healing journey and guide you through empowering meditations as you connect ever more deeply into who you truly are. I love holding space for each and every one of you. Contact me on +61 4 2451 8884 or email hello@pippaneve.com.