A dynamic I see come up a lot with my clients is their worry about making someone else mad or hurting someone else’s feelings. Empathy and kindness are important, lovely, and the cornerstone of a healthy society (imo). But concerns about others’ feelings become problematic when they cause us to consistently override our own important needs. I see people ending up feeling resentful or depressed or helpless because they feel they can’t take care of themselves for fear of “hurting” someone else. (See also, “I Want to Stop People Pleasing! [If That’s Okay with You].”)
Often this is a dynamic that started in childhood. Babies instinctually want (need!) to stay connected to their caregiver, and if the caregiver has emotions that make them “disconnect” from Baby, Baby will sense it and do everything in their power to stay connected. For example, my mom was stressed a lot (single mom working full time to raise two kids – that’s stressful!) and her anger was scary to me. Angry mom = disconnection = “I’m not safe!” So I instinctively made sure to quiet or ignore my own needs so as to keep mom from getting angry. That strategy helped me stay connected to my caregiver and survive my childhood, but in adulthood I realized the great emotional cost of valuing others’ emotional needs over my own.
Learning to advocate for our own needs can feel so scary at the beginning – “What if they get angry at me for saying no?” “I don’t want to hurt them; hurting someone means I’m a bad person.”
No, you’re not a bad person. You’re a person with individual needs, just like every other person on the planet. And sometimes our individual needs conflict with someone else’s individual needs. That’s the nature of interacting with other humans! So it doesn’t make you a bad person to have needs or to speak up about them.
We can acknowledge that it feels uncomfortable if our “saying no” or “telling someone our needs” results in the other person having feelings (disappointed, sad, mad). It is hard to see someone else in emotional suffering. Seeing someone we care about feel sad, afraid, or angry is uncomfortable and difficult. We want to take the pain away! But when we do that by overriding our own needs, it’s a recipe for resentment and depression. Instead, we can learn to tolerate the discomfort of seeing someone else in pain. We can have empathy for them even as we may choose to honor our own needs. For example, I let Tal know that I’m not able to pick them up from the airport. Tal is disappointed and angry, since it’ll mean a long bus ride or expensive Uber ride for them. They’re not wrong! That is a huge hassle, and I can empathize with them. And at the same time, in this instance I choose to prioritize my own need for sleep to prepare for a big work day coming up. Other times I may choose differently, but this time I choose to prioritize myself, and yes, that does make it harder for Tal. I take deep breaths and trust that Tal’s and my relationship will survive this rough spot. (Side note – if it looks like this incident will tank our relationship, then I can consider two possibilities: maybe this is a pattern of me not giving enough, and Tal is over it and done with selfish me. Then I can consider if this is a pattern in my relationships, in which case I may want to consider changing my behavior. Or, if I notice that friendship with Tal depends on me giving up things that are important to me, maybe I decide it’s okay to let the relationship go.)
When we can be both connected to the other (caring about them, choosing when to compromise, giving to them because it makes us happy to do so, not out of fear) and separate from the other (noticing, naming, and advocating for your own needs) we build healthy relationships and healthy self-care.