Page 34 - EW Magazine 5-2 FINAL

34 extraordinary women Volume 5 I ssue 1

friend to friend

L y s a T e r K e u r s t

The Rip Current of People Pleasing

Real love cares enough about other people to say no when saying yes would build up a barrier in the relation-ship. Real love pursues authenticity rather than chasing acceptance.

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Hello, my name is Lysa and I want people to like me. So, I will sometimes say “yes” when I really want to say “no.” And when I do say no, I sometimes worry about how much I’m disappointing the person who asks.

I would much rather write this article in past tense. Like, “I used to struggle with this, but I’ve really matured past it all. So, let me share how I bravely say no and never fret

over that decision.” However, this isn’t a past tense issue in my life.

Though I have gotten better, I still have quite a ways to go. When I wrote my book,

Unglued , I confessed how hard it is for me to be honest with some people. My tendency to just stuff and smile has at its root this desire to be liked. No matter how I want to spin what this is, I have to call it people pleasing. And you know you

are caught in the rip current of people pleasing when you dread saying yes but feel powerless to say no. It’s part of my DNA to love others—love them and not disappoint them—but I have to realize real love is honest. Real love cares enough about other people to say no when saying yes would build up a barrier in the relationship. Real love pursues authen-ticity rather than chasing

acceptance. So here’s how I’m challenging myself to break free from people-pleasing… and you may have to make peace with these same realities.

I Am Going to Disappoint Someone Every “yes” will cost me some-thing. Every “no” carries with it the potential for disappoint-ment. Either, I will disappoint this person by not meeting the full extent of his or her expec-tations or I will disappoint my family by taking too much time away from them.

Do I wish I could say yes to everything and still keep my sanity? Yes! But I can’t, so here’s how I will say no: “Thank you for asking me. My heart says yes, yes, yes… but the reality of my time says no.” A good verse for this is Proverbs 29:25, “The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.”

I Must Pause Before Giving Immediate Answers Sometimes it might be real-istic for me to say yes, but I’ve learned to let my “yes” sit for a spell. Pausing allows me to assess how much stress this will add into my life. The person