#94: A 10-Step Guide to One People Pleaser’s Inability to Say No

HUMOR

Step 1: Receive an invitation to something you have no interest in by someone you barely know but whom you deeply need to like you. Not for any particular or legitimate reason. This isn’t a family-by-marriage or professionally-linked situation. They are a random friend of a friend you could easily never see again in your life. Hardly any social overlap at all. Yet the mere thought of them disliking you makes your palms sweat and stomach churn.

Step 2: Immediately identify this event as something you do not want to attend. This, although you’ll hardly believe it, is progress in your anti-people pleasing journey. Being attuned to your wants at all is new territory. I’m not talking about a pleasant stroll in a quiet park. I’m talking about a sandwalk around the mines in the war zone of your newfound needs. There’s terror in this territory. You’re unskilled here and it shows.

Step 3: Betray yourself. As quickly as you determined you didn’t want to attend, you decided you would. Why? Because you have to. Alas, that’s no longer a good enough answer for your undeniably ill but now years-of-therapied brain. You’ll have to answer for this. But the outcome, of course, will be to go. That’s non-negotiable.

Step 4: Develop an irrational and intricately detailed narrative as to why you have to attend the event. This fringe friend. Let’s be honest, you hardly know her. Why would she have invited YOU to this? There must be a reason. You are special to her in some way. What an honor. To decline would be to spit in the face of that honor. And like you always say (have never said) as if you were a 12th century soldier trying to make meaning of the Middle Ages, “What are we without our honor?” This fringe friend is lonely. She must be. Why else would she invite you, whom she barely knows, to this event? It could not possibly be that she thought you might enjoy it and wanted to extend an invite to an event she considers fun. No…she must have a hard time making friends. No one else would go with her so she was forced to invite someone she’s met only once and said all of 14 words to. And who are you, in all your friendly, charming people-personhood, to deny her company to this event she clearly holds so dear? If you don’t go, she’ll surely be devastated, alone, and distraught. This is your charge. Your duty. To save her from this plague you’ve invented and have exactly zero evidence exists. You are a mentally ill martyr. A savior with a serotonin deficiency. This person you barely know needs you. You also need you, but that’s not important right now. What’s important is her. What is her last name again? Oh right, you didn’t forget it, you never knew it.

Step 5: Research said event. Oh look! It will take 90 minutes to get there at the scheduled time of arrival. You’re unwilling to spend that much time sitting with yourself while in active betrayal of said self, so you’ll have to plan your day around avoiding that traffic. If you drive there five hours early, it will only take 30 minutes. This is the logical answer. You will arrive at the location five hours early to avoid an extra hour in the car. Genius! Of course, you’ll need to fill the time with something. Lightbulb! You’ll see a movie in the area. They don’t have showtimes for the one you’ve been wanting to see, but there are plenty of showtimes for one you’re sure you won’t like but feel you must watch to be part of the discourse. You know, because you’re working towards a job in entertainment. It’s actually your duty to see this scary movie alone in the middle of the day so that you don’t have to sit in traffic for this event you don’t want to attend but have decided you must attend or you will die probably, based on the current fight or flight (spoiler: the alluring secret third option you will take to remedy this cortisol spike is FAWN) response in your body. LA will be the death of you! Or force you to stop people pleasing because you’re priced out of gas alone. Hahaha this town! It’s crazy! Definitely the town that’s crazy! Not you!

Step 6: Reach out for help. Because you’re six years into paying a professional to beat the people pleasing out of you (metaphorically), you’re fully aware that what you’re doing is wrong and frankly stupid. (Clearly you haven’t exactly taken to the whole self-compassion thing your therapist is always yapping about.) So you tell your boyfriend you’ve been invited to this event and feel you have to go but you don’t want to go. “Just say no,” he says. WOW LIKE IT’S THAT EASY! Oh to be a MAN and have the entire patriarchy stacked in your favor! What does he even know?! Say no!??? The privilege! Who does he even think he is? “I feel like I have to go because [insert brief-enough-that-you-don’t-sound-completely-batshit version of the Lonely Girl I Must Save narrative you’ve very clearly made up to justify doing this thing you don’t want to do], y’know?” He looks at you knowingly and lovingly. “If you want to be her friend, maybe you should invite her to coffee or something another time instead of going to this event you have no interest in?”

Step 7: Reject the help. Yes, you sought it out as a feeble attempt to save yourself or allow yourself to be saved. You knew what he would say. He knows you. He loves you. He understands your tendencies and is gentle in helping you work through them. He’s incredibly smart and a great listener. And also what does he know? Better to disappoint him (and yourself) than this girl you barely know. You’re going to this event you’ve already started to dread for this person you’ve already started to resent whether your loving partner gets it or not. MEN, ugh, am I right?

Step 8: Push past all the alarm bells ringing in your body. Ring ring! You do not want to do this! Shove that down. Ring ring! You are in no way obligated to do this! Shove that down. Ring ring! Your needs are important too! Shove that down. Ring ring! Building a friendship on a shared experience you have no interest in feels like a form of dishonesty that makes you untrustworthy to your potential new friend and yourself! Shove that down. Ring ring! You have actual work to do tomorrow and probably shouldn’t waste an entire day planning five plus hours around an event you now actively despise! Shove that down. Ring ring! Ring ring! Ring ring!

Step 9: Respond to lonely, desperate, needs-to-be-saved, fringe acquaintance with stupid interests, “Omg I would love to!”

Step 10: Crank up the dread to a thousand. Resentment to 4k. Wrap yourself in the smallpox blanket of self-abandonment and betrayal you’ve come to know so well. Hate yourself for this.

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Woof! I wish this was fiction, but it’s so clearly not. Pray! For! Me! If you want to, absolutely no pressure. I can totally handle it on my own. I’m sure you’re super busy with way more important stuff so truly no worries haha lol. What’s that? You need help moving a piano on my birthday? No, I’ll absolutely be there.

ily bye,

Ariana