i'm changing, and some of my friends don't like the new me

mixed feelings is a bi-weekly advice column. Every other week, a different mental health expert, author, or journalist will respond to most pressing existential conundrums. If you’re dealing with one right now, use our anonymous write-in form to be considered for a future newsletter.

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dear mixed feelings,

For a year, I worked on not being such a doormat. It worked! I feel more opinionated and confident. But...I've been hearing from friends and family that I've gotten too "irritable"...It makes me miss my old personality even though some aspects of it made me unhappy....

I used to adopt an "always be extremely kind" policy. I could never say no to people...People pleasing made me happy for a while…but I decided that I didn't have the energy to hold back anymore. I slowly started being more confident…[and] gave my input more. It felt amazing to be myself….I stood up to people and called them out when they did something to hurt me...I have made quality friends who appreciate me and strengthened old friendships through this change.

However, some people don't like this, and I'm not sure if it's justified. I got into an argument with a close friend group who would always try to encourage me to eat healthier before the change…I realized that every time they commented on what I ate, I felt bad about myself…I was always scared to eat in front of them because they always had something to say...I began calling this out and…they stopped, but it felt like they were just trying to please some immature child instead of [trying to understand] why I felt that way...I've since drifted from one of them and distanced from a few others. Typing this out, I wonder if I took their help the wrong way...

I've changed, but a sliver of people pleasing remains…I get into arguments more often now after standing up for myself…which seems like a strange tradeoff. Some of my friend groups have even turned to other people with similar personalities as my old self to confide in, ask favors from, and organize events. I'd be lying if I said it didn't sting a little...How do you escape a people-pleasing mentality while accepting that some people may not appreciate that?" — lostinpersonality, she/her

Follow her inconsistent content here.

dear lostinpersonality,

Congrats on seeking out the person you want to be and making some big, hard moves in her direction. It can be very scary to decide that the person you’ve been for 20 or 30 or 40-some-odd years isn’t the person you are anymore. In the moments when I’ve felt that, the scariest part was always the next thought, “well ok, if I’m not her, who am I?” But right out of college, I got the best professional advice of my career: Dreams change. And I have applied that to my life. 

A lot of the things that are troubling for you are all external — how you’re perceived, how people are reacting. I’d love to say they don’t matter, but that’s not how we operate. If I were to hazard a guess based on how your old “doormat” behavior showed up and how this new version is presenting itself, you’re a sensitive person who is in tune with the needs, wants, and feelings of others. And of course, you want to be liked! I think we all do. 

who is this for?

What’s so hard with people-pleasing is that it’s tied up in being a “good” person. I think many of us — women-identifying folks especially — have been raised to consider (or, prioritize) others. I was raised to believe that being polite was of the utmost importance, even at the cost of my own personal importance. I have had to unlearn that personal sacrifice, and learn, particularly as a Black woman, where my silence or accommodation is in service of the comfort of others over myself. 

I have found it valuable to ask myself in those moments of “politeness” — who is this for? It doesn’t mean you have to be rude (legit rude, not just opinionated or honest) but sometimes the toll that “goodness” takes on you isn’t worth it in the long run. 

Some psychiatrists believe people-pleasing behavior to be a form of trauma response, and you may have found safety in aligning yourself with others. I asked Incia Rashid-Dawdy, therapist with The Expansive Group, about other potential reasons folks engage in people-pleasing behaviors. “With people-pleasing, the underlying motivation can vary, but can include hoping to maintain an agreeable, positive reputation for yourself, to avoid disappointing others by saying no, or to avoid disappointing yourself by acknowledging you might not have the capacity for extra work,” she said.  “The question to ask is, ‘who are you trying to please, and why?’ We live in a perfection-seeking society, so, oftentimes we place performance pressure on ourselves in a way we would never expect from our friends, and often feel exhausted keeping up with the internal narrative of ourselves as a result of our productivity.” 

Understanding the “why” of both your former people-pleasing ways and the boundaries you currently set will help you feel more confident in those times when you wonder if you’re being too harsh. Once you’re clear (or as clear as you can get) about your motivations either in the moment or after, you’ll be better armed to trust yourself when people aren’t responding to your boundaries as graciously as one might like. 

boundaries up ≠ walls up

A few years ago, I was sitting across the table from a good friend of mine from high school during a quick jaunt upstate. We’d known each other for over a decade at that point, and although we’d had moments of tension, I thought we were doing a great job of resetting our friendship as adults. While sipping our coffee she let me know that she’d been doing some reflecting and that some of her behaviors were rooted in people-pleasing and her fear of abandonment rather than a genuine sense of her own desires and sense of self. She was, in her words, getting better at saying no to me. My immediate reaction was to get defensive and counter her examples with explanations that put the onus on her, rather than me. I wasn’t livid, but I was certain she had me all wrong. 

In the moment, it felt like I was being accused of being a bad person and I resented that. Of course, what she said wasn’t actually about me, it was about how she related to me. I took time to think about it and over the course of more conversations, I realized that this was part of her journey and she didn’t think I was being intentionally manipulative. In order for her to be the person and friend she needed to be, she needed to shift how she moved through her relationships. There were some starts and stops, and some sensitivities on both our ends, but not that long after we had this new, more open relationship where we both felt comfortable expressing our needs and boundaries. I think, and hope, that a few of these friends are having a gut reaction to your new, more vocal self, but with time and a little introspection, they will come around. 

That said, allow me to alight upon this soapbox for a moment and say this: Your friend group who was always commenting on what you ate, to the point of making you scared to eat in front of them, was not offering you help. It is never, ever okay to comment on what, when, or how much someone is eating, especially repeatedly or often. I don’t know you and your needs around food but unless this group of friends was actually a coven of doctors and nutritionists you were paying to research, monitor, and make suggestions, they had no business weighing in on what you were eating. Their reaction of treating your very clear boundary around something that wasn’t really their business to begin with makes it clear that they were never really that interested in your health and happiness.

Part of recognizing that dreams change, is recognizing that friendships do, too. While your relationships will always be these ever evolving blobs of feelings and emotions, this big hurdle of losing some former friends as the new you emerges, is temporary. 

how to tell your friends about the “new” you

That being said, I’m sure there are people from your life, or even in that group, who do feel important to your life, and the potential of losing them is difficult. “Setting boundaries can be challenging for a variety of reasons [because] the act of setting a boundary means something in the relationship must change in order for the boundary to be respected and followed,” Rashid-Dawdy said. “The closer we are to someone, the more challenging it can feel to set a boundary because we become aware of how much is at risk of being changed. In order to set this boundary, you will need to name the issue, share why it feels unhelpful to you, and develop an alternative response when the boundary is enforced.” 

If you’re not already and you’re able to, working with a therapist like Rashid-Dawdy can help you parse through some of these complicated feelings. In the meantime, think about who from this friend group made you feel the most like you, supported you or listened to you, even if you felt that they did engage with your people-pleasing behavior. If there are folks who still feel valuable and important to you, who you think this new version of you could get along with, try having a conversation with them. You can lay out that you’ve been doing some work on yourself, and that it has changed how you relate to them, but not necessarily how you feel about them (if that is in fact true). Check in on if they’ve noticed a shift and how they’re reacting to it. If they’re open, honest, and amenable to what you’re saying, it might be worth figuring out a new way of caring for and relating to each other. 

But let’s not forget about the people who have flocked toward this more assured version of you. How can you grow with them and meet more folks that make you feel seen? When you stand in their glow and see how they treat you and each other, you’ll know you’ve made the right choice. 

You’ve done a lot of the big work. Now is the time for the little discussions, choices, and reflections that will help reinforce the person you’re becoming. Sit in those moments and worry less about how they were received and focus on how you felt and feel about it. Be honest with yourself about your feelings and motivations, and be gentle if they fall short of your ideal. Knowing yourself is a slog, but it makes everything so much better. — Nora Taylor