I’ve been thinking a lot lately about why women don’t 
value their own needs and tend to value other’s needs more.
First, let’s define and explore the subject. In my 30+ years of coaching, I’ve noticed a tendency in so many women to automatically focus their attention on the needs of others before themselves. Maybe this comes from some maternal instinct that’s been bred into us. For the sake of our discussion here, let’s set aside the maternal component. I completely get why a mother puts the needs of her baby or young children before her own at times.
But I often see women put the needs of their husbands and partners, friends and relatives before her own.
When I ask why, I often hear a combination of these themes:
- I just want everyone to be happy
- If they’re not happy, they might be upset with me
- If they’re upset with me, they will not like me
- If they’re upset with me, they will reject me
What we can see here is that she believes this thought:
I need you to be happy because that’s how I know that I will receive approval and acceptance
Then, she focuses her efforts on pleasing you. She focuses on your needs. She disregards her own needs. But it’s all really a big fat lie because it comes from her need for approval and acceptance.
So if you’re a people pleaser, you’re actually driven by your own needs!
OUCH.
Don’t we (yes, I’ve been guilty of this) like to believe that we are the opposite of selfish? Don’t we tell ourselves that it would be selfish not to focus on their needs and pay attention to our own needs?
Let me set you straight.
Focusing too much on other’s needs is not “just my personality”. It stems from a lack of valuing yourself, your needs, your lovability, and your worth. It’s sometimes referred to as
Over-giving to prove your worth
The point I really want you to see is that it’s not selfish to focus on your own needs. As a matter of fact, it’s selfish NOT TO! Because when you’re not (and you’re focused only on your partner’s needs), you’re really trying to get your own need met for approval and acceptance and love and lying about it (to yourself and others).
So learning how to focus on your own needs and meet them is healthy. It allows you to then focus on other’s needs from an honest, clean place.
As with all coaching, the questions you ask are key. Let’s start with
- What am I believing about myself that creates lack of worth or acceptance or approval?
- Why do I think others won’t approve of me?
- Why do I believe that if I don’t do for you or please you, then you will reject me?
Understanding the answers to these questions will lead you toward creating better beliefs about yourself. I want to help you with that! Tell me in the comments what you come up with and then I can address them next week. Or head over to my Facebook page and comment there and I can answer you directly.
I have a free bonus exercise for you to do that will help you strengthen your ability to identify and meet your own needs.
Get the Exercise
