Connor Beaton explains that "people pleasing" is an attachment-based issue formed in childhood within family systems where love was conditional and performance-based. He argues this leads people to over-function in relationships—constantly performing to receive love, validation, or acceptance—creating a chronic cycle of caregiving in hopes of reciprocation.
What the heck is people pleasing? Why do so many people struggle with it? First and foremost, people pleasing is really an attachment based issue where you learned in your childhood, growing up in your family system that other people's needs were more relevant and more important than yours. People pleasers are sometimes people that have grown up in an environment where love was performance based. Love was very conditioned and conditional on how well you performed. And so you learned that in order for me to get my needs met, I have to perform perfectly in my relationships. In order for me to get any type of love or validation or acceptance or appreciation, I just need to perform really, really well. Which causes you to over function in the relationship. And that over functioning is sort of this chronic frenzy where you are constantly trying to take care of the other person so that hopefully it'll be a reciprocate. And that's really the dynamic for a people.
How to Raise Strong, Unshakable Boys in Today's Culture, with Dr. Shefali Tsabary
