How to Walk into a Room: The Art of Knowing When to Stay and When to Walk Away

by Emily P. Freeman

People-pleasing is evidence of an unhealthy emotional system and is not a brush-it-away, bless-your-heart kind of bad habit. When you’re stuck in a vortex of deeply caring what other people think, you’re held captive in a system you’re too afraid to question. People-pleasing is a serious problem and a dangerous cancer, and if you don’t find the courage to name it and the clarity to reject it, the prognosis is grim. It’s keeping you from your best work, your best rest, and it’s sabotaging your freedom. And here’s the secret about people-pleasing no one really tells us: it doesn’t actually please the people. When you’re trying to please the people rather than working to discern from a centered, wholehearted place, your work will never be enough. It will always exhaust you and never fully please those around you. Nobody wins and no one is free. What wounded, anxious people need most is not you as they think you ought to be but the solid presence of a well-differentiated leader who insists on being okay with or without their consent. This is as true for a parent as it is true for a president.