Learn why people pleasing destroys relationships and self-worth, and discover practical strategies to set boundaries and reclaim your authentic self.
People pleasing looks like generosity on the surface. It seems kind, considerate, and selfless. Yet underneath this exterior often lies a pattern that damages relationships, breeds resentment, and keeps you from ever truly being yourself.
According to Dr. Robert Glover, who has worked with thousands of people pleasers over three decades, the behavior isn’t actually about being nice to others—it’s an unconscious strategy for managing deep-seated shame and anxiety while trying to control others’ reactions.
Understanding why you people please is the first step toward breaking free.
What People Pleasing Really Is
People pleasing isn’t the same as being kind or considerate. The difference lies in the motivation. True kindness comes from an authentic desire to contribute to someone’s wellbeing. People pleasing comes from fear—fear of rejection, disapproval, anger, or abandonment.
Dr. Glover explains that people pleasers have internalized at a very young age the belief: “I’m not okay as I am.” This shame drives them to become what they think others want them to be, constantly adjusting themselves based on feedback from their environment, holding their finger up to check which way the wind is blowing.
The people pleaser develops what might look like empathy but is actually hypervigilance—constantly scanning for signs of disapproval and adjusting behavior accordingly. The goal isn’t connection; it’s safety through control.
The Evolutionary Roots
People pleasing often begins in childhood for logical reasons. As infants and young children, we are completely dependent on our caregivers. For a child, abandonment literally equals death. We learn very early to navigate the big, powerful people who control our survival.
This becomes particularly pronounced with mothers or primary female caregivers. From birth, survival depends on successfully managing that relationship. Boys especially learn to please women, and this continues through early education where the vast majority of teachers are female.
Dr. Glover notes that there are “four times more female fighter pilots in the U.S. Air Force by percentage than there are male kindergarten teachers.” Young boys spend years learning that success means figuring out how to please the women in authority.
None of this is inherently problematic. The issue emerges when there’s no transition out of this dynamic. Historically, around age 12, boys would be taken from the world of women by fathers or male mentors, initiated into masculine independence, and taught to face fears and become comfortable being uncomfortable. Without this transition, many people remain stuck in approval-seeking mode indefinitely.
The Covert Contracts Driving the Behavior
People pleasers operate on what Dr. Glover calls “covert contracts”—unconscious agreements they believe they have with the world. These take the form of: “If I do X, then Y will happen.”
The most common covert contract is: “If I meet everyone else’s needs without them asking, then they will meet my needs without me having to ask.” The fatal flaw? Nobody else knows this contract exists. They don’t know they’re supposed to be reciprocating or reading your mind.
This creates a painful dynamic. The people pleaser gives and gives, expecting reciprocation that never comes (because how could it, when the other person doesn’t know the rules?), and slowly builds resentment. Eventually, they explode or withdraw, leaving the other person confused: “I thought everything was fine. Why didn’t you say something?”
Another common covert contract: “If I’m good and don’t cause problems, then I’ll be liked and loved.” The people pleaser becomes needless and wantless, never rocking the boat, always accommodating. But this makes them boring at best and invisible at worst. The very strategy they use to gain love makes them less lovable, because there’s no real person there to love—just a mirror reflecting back what they think you want.
Why People Pleasers Are Bad at Receiving
A surprising characteristic of people pleasers is that they’re terrible at receiving. This seems counterintuitive—wouldn’t someone who gives a lot also be good at receiving? But the reverse is true.
People pleasers often grew up in families where someone else was designated as the needy person. Maybe dad’s needs always came first, or mom was overwhelmed, or a sibling had serious problems. The people pleaser learned that their needs draw too much attention and aren’t as important as others’ needs.
As Dr. Glover explains, being a bad receiver “robs people of the enjoyment of helping you.” When someone offers to help with something small and you refuse, you deny them the pleasure of giving. You also train them that you don’t want or need anything, ensuring they’ll eventually stop offering.
This inability to receive extends to all areas of life. How can you receive a compliment if you immediately deflect it? How can you receive love if you don’t trust it? How can you receive success if you don’t believe you deserve it? The people pleaser remains in a loop of giving to others while starving themselves, building resentment about the very dynamic they’ve created.
The Hidden Dishonesty
People pleasers often pride themselves on being honest, good people. But underneath the surface lies a core dishonesty that most aren’t aware of. They’re constantly editing themselves, telling people what won’t rock the boat rather than what’s actually true.
Dr. Glover shares his own experience: “I remember pretty early in my process, I realized almost everything I told my then-wife was whatever won’t rock the boat. So I told her, ‘I’m going to work on being honest. Whenever I catch myself making up a story to tell you, I’m going to come tell you: I was going to lie to you, here’s the lie I was going to tell you, here’s the whole truth.'”
The surprising result? His wife, whom he’d thought of as someone who overreacted to everything, responded calmly when he told her the truth. The drama he was trying to avoid through people pleasing was actually being created by his lack of honesty.
This dishonesty extends beyond words. It’s in the things you agree to do but resent doing. It’s in the smile you force when you’re actually angry. It’s in saying “I’m fine” when you’re not. Each small dishonesty builds a wall between you and genuine connection.
The Resentment Trap
Perhaps the most toxic byproduct of people pleasing is the resentment that inevitably builds. You’ve been doing everything right, being good, meeting everyone’s needs, making sacrifices—and you’re not getting what you expected in return.
Author Neil Strauss captured this perfectly: “Unspoken expectations are premeditated resentment.” Every time you do something for someone with an unspoken expectation of reciprocation, you’re setting up future resentment.
This resentment often comes as a shock to the people in your life. From their perspective, you’ve been happily giving and never expressing needs or dissatisfaction. They didn’t know you were keeping score or expecting anything in return. When you finally explode or withdraw, they feel ambushed.
The people pleaser, meanwhile, feels justified in their resentment: “I’ve done so much for you!” But they’ve never actually been honest about what they wanted or needed. They’ve been making unilateral decisions to give, secretly expecting reciprocation they never asked for.
The Anxiety Management Function
At its core, people pleasing is a strategy for managing anxiety. The people pleaser is constantly in a state of fight-or-flight response, trying to prevent the disaster they fear: rejection, anger, abandonment, being found unworthy.
Dr. Glover describes his own anxiety response when his wife gets a certain look on her face: “I’ll just watch myself have this anxiety state that I got to talk her down, smooth it over, get her back to good, make her happy again. And I’m thinking, why am I worried about what this short little Mexican woman, what look she has on her face? And really, as I sat with it, it triggers a really old emotional state that does feel like I’m going to die if this doesn’t get better right now.”
The anxiety is disproportionate to the actual threat because it’s tapping into primal childhood fears when disapproval actually could mean death through abandonment. The people pleaser never learned to self-soothe or tolerate others’ negative emotions. Instead, they developed elaborate strategies to prevent anyone from ever being upset with them.
The Path to Recovery: Making Your Needs a Priority
Breaking free from people pleasing begins with a radical shift: making your needs a priority. This feels selfish to people pleasers, which is exactly why it’s necessary.
Dr. Glover describes his own journey: “One of the earliest things I had to start doing was making me a priority, where I put myself first. I’d do for everybody else but I wouldn’t make me a priority. I’d make sure my wife and kids went to the dentist, but I wouldn’t go to the dentist. If I saw something on sale, I’d buy it for them but not for me.”
Start small. Ask yourself: What do I actually want right now? What do I need? What would feel good to me? Then do those things, even if—especially if—it feels selfish.
This isn’t about becoming narcissistic or uncaring. It’s about including yourself in the circle of people whose needs matter. You can’t pour from an empty cup, as the cliché goes, but more importantly, constantly self-sacrificing teaches others that your needs don’t matter. You train them to ignore you.
Learning to Be Honest
People pleasers need to practice radical honesty. This doesn’t mean being brutal or unkind. It means telling the truth about what you think, feel, want, and need—even when it might cause discomfort.
Start by catching yourself when you’re about to say what you think someone wants to hear rather than what’s actually true. Pause. Feel the fear that arises. Then tell the truth anyway.
You’ll likely discover what Dr. Glover did: people can handle the truth far better than you imagine. The drama you’re trying to avoid through people pleasing is often less than the drama created by dishonesty and the eventual explosion of resentment.
Practice saying no without elaborate justifications. “No, that doesn’t work for me” is a complete sentence. Practice expressing preferences: “I’d rather do X” or “I didn’t like that.” Practice revealing yourself: “I’m actually feeling frustrated” or “That hurt my feelings.”
Developing Boundaries
People pleasers often have no boundaries, or only rigid, explosive boundaries. They say yes to everything until they can’t take it anymore, then they blow up or disappear.
Healthy boundaries are different. They’re calm, clear, and consistent statements of what you will and won’t do, what you will and won’t accept. As Dr. Glover points out, most people never learn boundaries because children aren’t taught to set them—the big people get to do whatever they want to the little people.
Learning boundaries as an adult requires practice and support. Start with small boundaries around your time and energy. Practice saying, “I need some time alone tonight” or “I can help you with that next week, but not today.”
Boundaries aren’t about controlling others; they’re about defining yourself. You’re not telling others what they can or can’t do. You’re stating what you will do if certain things happen. This distinction is crucial.
Finding Safe People
Perhaps the most important step in recovery is finding safe people—a therapist, coach, or men’s group where you can practice being authentic without managing everyone’s reactions.
Dr. Glover emphasizes: “You didn’t become a people pleaser in social isolation. Don’t try to get over it in social isolation. We have to have safe people to start releasing our shame, to tell people ‘I’ve got this story about myself’ and have people go, ‘That’s not bad, that’s not terrible at all, that’s normal.'”
In safe environments, you can practice revealing yourself, expressing needs, and receiving support. You can learn that disapproval isn’t death, that conflict can be navigated, that your authentic self is actually more lovable than your people-pleasing mask.
The Freedom on the Other Side
Breaking free from people pleasing doesn’t mean becoming selfish or uncaring. It means becoming genuine. It means your yes actually means yes, and your no means no. It means the kindness you show comes from authentic care rather than fear.
It means you can have real relationships based on mutual truth rather than performance. It means you can receive as well as give. It means you can live your own life rather than constantly adjusting yourself to manage others’ reactions.
The irony is that people typically like and respect authentic people far more than people pleasers. When you stop trying so hard to be liked, you often become more likable. When you stop trying to control everyone’s reactions, you become more trustworthy. When you include yourself in the circle of people who matter, others take you more seriously.
People pleasing feels safe, but it’s a prison. Authenticity feels risky, but it’s freedom. The journey from one to the other isn’t easy, but it’s worth it. You deserve to be liked for who you actually are, not for how well you can contort yourself into what you think others want.
Source: This article is based on a podcast discussion with Dr Glower & Chris Williamsson called “How Men Keep Sabotaging Themselves”