• The need to please doesn’t mean something is wrong with us – it arises from our normal, hard-wired desire to be loved, to belong and to be safe. (2:25)
• When people-pleasing becomes a problem. (3:48)
• Why chronic people pleasing doesn’t actually work in the long run. (4:56)
• Conditions that often create chronic people-pleasing, why it isn’t our fault and it can absolutely be overcome. (6:12) 
• The truth that chronic people pleasers need to learn. (8:07)
• How chronic people pleasing further disconnects us from our own worthiness of love. (8:23)
• What stress-reduction research says about how we perceive our ability to handle threats and why it’s relevant to people pleasing in our relationships. (9:47)
• Micki’s personal journey of unlearning that she always had to “be good” to keep herself safe. (11:14)
• Michelle’s gilded cage of having to “be nice” and why she prefers being kind instead. (13:06)
• How to know if we’re in chronic people-pleasing mode – the hallmark signs to notice. (14:52)
• When we are disconnected from who we are, we don’t enter fully into our relationships. (16:04)
• How chronic people-pleasers can begin to see ourselves and our loveliness again. (23:09)
• How perfectionism is embedded in people-pleasing and a helpful mantra to remember when we’re struggling to be perfect. (25:53)
• How mindfulness can help us cultivate the four heart qualities. (27:19)
• What to do when you receive negative push-back from people who aren’t used to you asking for what you want. (31:29)
• What happens when we open to our inner loveliness and can bring our true selves into our relationships. (42:57) 

Michelle [00:00:05]

Hi, everyone, I’m Michelle Becker, and you’re listening to the Well Connected Relationships podcast. In today’s episode, we’ll be talking with Miki Fine about people pleasing where it comes from, the impact it has on relationships and how to free ourselves and our relationships from it. Miki is the founder of Mindful Living and has been a certified mindfulness based stress reduction teacher for twenty four years. She’s the author of The Need to Please Mindfulness Skills to Gain Freedom from People Pleasing and Approval Seeking. And her children’s book May All People and Pigs Be Happy. 

She’s taught mindfulness and loving kindness meditation since nineteen ninety four in a variety of settings, including her private practice, research environments, Rice University, the M.D. Anderson Center Education and the Young Center. I met Miki through our mutual affiliation with the UC San Diego Center for Mindfulness, where we both provide mentorship to developing teachers. Miki’s a mentor for mindfulness based stress reduction teachers, and I mentor mindful self compassion teachers. I found Miki an absolute delight to talk with. For me, she’s one of those people I find myself inspired by, and wanting to hear more from. I’m glad we’ll have a chance to do that today. Welcome, Miki. Thanks for joining us.

Miki [00:01:28]

Oh, I’m so glad to be here. When I when I saw the your request, I just thought, oh, this is this will be so fun. And you and I haven’t connected for a long time and that that was actually the biggest draw.

Michelle [00:01:40]

Absolutely. And as we said earlier, before we started the recording, wouldn’t it be lovely if we were sitting in a coffee shop together so it would in my mind we are.

Miki [00:01:51]

Yes. Yes.

Michelle [00:01:53]

Yeah. So what would you say? I love both of your books. I’m a big fan, actually, of both of your books. And today, as we’re talking a little bit more about the people pleasing aspect of things, maybe you could start us off with just talking about what people pleasing is. And and I know you often talk about chronic people pleasing. So could you give us a little info about that?

Miki [00:02:18]

Sure. First off, I mean, any time you say chronic people pleasing, it’s like, oh, no. Right? And and there isn’t even a connotation of. Difficulty or something that something that you have that’s not good people pleasing. But first off, it arises from an intention to be loved and to be safe. And that is that’s the kind of the base. And when certain things happen in our lives, we become more fearful of that not happening. And thus we try to please and please, please and please. And so it chronic people pleasing is the desire to be loved and to be safe, but also it comes out of fear instead of love, and that’s I think that’s a really major point that there’s fear there instead of like, oh, I love Michelle, I’m going to send her my book. Right. Yeah. And so and another point here is that the desire to be loved and to be safe is hardwired into us. It’s part of our DNA. It is not our fault. And it’s good. I mean, we’re a herd society. We need other people. And so there’s a part of this chronic people pleasing that is is really good. 

It’s just when it starts becoming like this ingrained habit and is motivated by fear. And I think one of the worst things that happens with chronic people pleasing is that we get cut off from ourselves, we look outside ourselves and we look outside of ourselves. What do they need? What can I do? What can I do? Oh, my gosh. Right. And and it cuts us off from our own goodness, which then perpetuates the people pleasing because we can’t see ourselves.

Michelle [00:04:29]

Absolutely, and it sounds like what I’m hearing you say is that. This need to be loved and to belong is really normal for all of us. I guess I couldn’t agree more. We are really wired that way, which is my whole reason for the relationships focus, you know, but also that that can when we connect with people, it can come from this inner place of I want I care about you, I enjoy you, I want to connect. Or it can come from this more fear based, externally focused place of I hope you’ll like me. 

Yes, yes, yeah, yeah.

Miki [00:05:11]

And and also another point about chronic people pleasing is that it doesn’t work in the long run.

Michelle [00:05:17]

Yeah. Can you say more about that?

Miki [00:05:24]

The very fact that we’re doing something. That we’re… That we try to make someone love us means that we’re not really quite being ourselves. It doesn’t come authentically and it has a sense of of force to it. And so we can never really have that work because we’re always thinking, oh, what do I need to do instead of how can I show my love?

Michelle [00:05:54]

Yeah, and if somebody does respond and like us, how could we know they really like us now? Haven’t shown them that piece?

Miki [00:06:03]

Yes, absolutely, absolutely. So I think in exploring chronic people pleasing that there needs to be a lot of compassion and a lot of kindness toward ourselves as we practice mindfulness to know how we how people pleasing works in our lives and as we come to understand that. Through mindfulness, to bring compassion to all of it. Because it’s not our fault.

Michelle [00:06:33]

Yeah, that that piece, that last little bit, it’s not our fault, yeah. That’s so important, right? It isn’t doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with us; that need to be loved is good. It’s means we’re a human being. Right. But that other piece, it’s not our fault. Can you speak to that a little bit? How does people pleasing this, the style of the chronic bit of it, how does that develop? What what happens for us?

Miki [00:07:04]

Well, it comes from our desire to be loved and safe and. There is no one who gives unconditional love all the time, it’s impossible because we’re human. There is suffering in our world and we all have some sort of wound that we act out of sometimes. Yeah. So the so there are some specific circumstances like abuse. Having love being given to us only when we meet certain expectations, not being valued for who we are, like you need to be different than you are. Also, a sense of not getting a say in what you what about your life? That if someone is making all your decisions for you and demanding that it be a certain way, then you’re left out of the equation and you think, oh my goodness, well, I must not know enough to even direct my life and to know what’s good for me. So there are some things like that can help that can. Make people pleasing arise because we get fearful about. Can I meet the mark?

Michelle [00:08:32]

Yeah,

Miki [00:08:32]

Will I be loved? Yeah, and maybe I’m not worthy of love if somebody is making all your decisions and only giving you love when you meet certain expectations and certainly with abuse and neglect, then we’re you know, we’re we’re. We get really scared.

Michelle [00:08:50]

Now and that it’s, you know, so it sounds like there’s a there’s kind of a deficiency for us, which is not our fault. Right. As we’re growing up, I’m saying as we’re growing up, I’m guessing that’s when it mostly develops. And the deficiency is that somehow we have to be due to our environment. We have failed to know, to learn that we’re lovable just as we are.

Miki [00:09:21]

Yes, yes. And in the act of people pleasing, always looking out here further makes us distant from our own… lovability. Because we don’t know who we are.

Michelle [00:09:37]

Mm hmm.

Miki [00:09:38]

You have to look out here.

Michelle [00:09:39]

Yeah. Because we’re always looking to the other people to see what do you need from me? How can I please you? Yeah. Will make you love me.

Miki [00:09:47]

Yeah. Yeah.

Michelle [00:09:48]

Beautiful. But there’s this other piece I’m hearing you talk about, which is the inner part of really discovering, uncovering perhaps. I think you call it our loveliness.

Miki [00:10:00]

Mm hmm.

Michelle [00:10:01]

Could you speak about that a little bit? That’s a I really love the way you talk about that.

Miki [00:10:07]

Well, I. That was a big idea for me in the beginning of my exploration years ago with mindfulness and actually still am I good enough, right?

Michelle [00:10:20]

Oh, yeah.

Miki [00:10:22]

And. I know, I know in my heart that we are all. Lovable, we are we are born good. And I think that drives. Our life. If we don’t know that we’re good, if we don’t know that there is this innate nature in us that is lovable, that is. Well, that is lovable, then. We struggle, and if you if you look at some stress reduction, I didn’t even think of this, but I just thought of it. Now, if if you look at stress reduction research, one big research study said that there’s an initial realization, oh, this is a challenge or this is a threat. And then whether it’s stressful or not depends on how you evaluate your ability to handle that difficulty. And so if we don’t think that we’re good enough, if we don’t think that we’re lovable, then we’re we’re in trouble.

Michelle [00:11:39]

Yeah,

Miki [00:11:39]

And I think that’s one of the reasons why there’s so much anxiety around people pleasing even when it’s not directed to, oh, my gosh, what am I going to do for this person? But in in any kind of challenge that we’re cut off from our our lovability. And that is that is absolutely. To be worked with and it can be worked with and I’m I’m living proof of it. This is something that’s been kind of a lifelong practice not a lifelong practice, but a lifelong struggle and a practice of many, many years that to find out, I guess I’m OK. That’s a nice thing.

Michelle [00:12:24]

That is a nice thing, Miki, this is we’re going to cut this part out. But do you do you want to tell a little bit of your story?

Miki [00:12:33]

Sure,

Michelle [00:12:33]

Look, to be interested in this, though, let me ask you a question about, uh huh. Yeah. So this you’re you’re saying this is a lifelong journey for you. I’m wondering if you could tell us a little bit more about how you came to land on people pleasing and how you healed from that?

Miki [00:12:51]

Yeah, I grew up in a really difficult circumstances. Um. Abuse that I didn’t remember actually until many years later and. My choice in life when I was a little girl was to be the good girl, and that way I wouldn’t get into too much trouble. And I became the quintessential, prom queen. The. I played golf because my dad wanted me to I didn’t even like it. I became a CPA because my husband was a CPA and my father was a CPA. And I was there ripping pages out of my book and having panic attacks when the CPA exam came up, because I had to pass it the first time in my own estimation. And so I grew up like this with this amazing focus toward everyone and everything that I did to be the nice girl.

Michelle [00:13:57]

Yeah.

Miki [00:13:58]

And so and there was a there were some really difficult beliefs that came out of that. But also, I didn’t become a drug addict. I didn’t become I didn’t die from. Whatever trouble I could have gotten into. And and I think it’s helped me in the long run to to free myself from some of that to. Come to this. To this place where I can actually write about it, and I knew that I wanted to write a book and it finally while I was sitting actually in meditation, it came to me: “people pleasing”. So and actually the other book came from people from meditation too; may, all pigs to be happy.

Michelle [00:14:51]

So it’s a powerful practice, so. Excuse me, I’m, um, I’m so taken by your story, you know, we have a couple of overlaps. My first career was also as a CPA. I was encouraged by my father to pursue finance because I didn’t know what else I wanted to do, you know? Oh, my goodness. Yeah. So so we’ve got a few overlaps there. And I also really resonate with this idea of being nice. You know, I was told as a little girl and as a young you know, as a teenager, I’d be nice. And I hated that. Be nice. You know, it was sort of like there was a gilded cage or there were some handcuffs, golden handcuffs or something that were going on that I felt like this what is this niceness thing? So I much prefer as an adult, I much prefer be kind. You know, that’s a value of mine to be kind. Yeah, but but not so much to be nice.

Miki [00:15:54]

Yeah. There’s a big difference in those two words, I think.

Michelle [00:15:57]

Yeah. Could you say more about that.

Miki [00:16:02]

I think kind of comes from the heart and it’s a little more genuine. We’re talking off the cuff here.

Michelle [00:16:12]

I’m good with it.

Miki [00:16:13]

And. Nice is you kind of got to conjure something up and put on a smile, whether you have one or not. Yeah. And just suck it up and be sweet and nice.

Michelle [00:16:27]

Yeah. Yeah,

Miki [00:16:28]

It’s probably hear that in my voice. Be sweet and nice.

Michelle [00:16:32]

Yeah, it does change. Right, because there’s a little there’s a mask to it. It’s sort of like I don’t really care how you are. Just do this for the other person.

Miki [00:16:42]

Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Michelle [00:16:46]

Wow, yeah, so so what a story, and I love that your story led to not just your own healing, which of course is important, but helping other people. You know, I think that’s one of the kindest things we can do when we share our story. How do we help other people with it? Because we’re not alone.

Miki [00:17:07]

Right. Right. Yeah, absolutely.

Michelle [00:17:12]

So you’ve given us a really good sense, I think, of how it develops both from a kind of a. I don’t want to say theoretical, that’s not quite the right word, but but also from a personal standpoint. You know how it develops. I’m curious what how do we know we’re in chronic people pleasing mode? What what kinds of what are the hallmarks of that?

Miki [00:17:42]

There there are all sorts of hallmarks. One is. If you notice your own thoughts, like I’ll do anything to be loved or it’s up to me or I’m not worthy of love or. What’s this person going to think of me and for me, one of the hallmarks was that I’m I’m always. I’m always thinking about somebody is watching me do that, I have to do the right thing. And. That’s hard, you know, so there’s this constant there’s a vigilance, I think, I have to be perfect. How do I stack up to what the expectation is? I come last. Probably a deference to anybody, anything. Excuse me. Probably a different. A different. I’m not sure that we can just cut that out, so there’s probably also deferring like, oh, you don’t need to do anything for me. I come last. So a little bit of a martyr kind of complex.

Michelle [00:18:53]

That makes sense and maybe even some discomfort with people doing something. For you.

Miki [00:18:57]

Absolutely.

Michelle [00:18:58]

Like training people. Yeah, I come last.

Miki [00:19:01]

Yeah. And that there are lots and lots of emotions that go with this anxiety about am I doing this well enough vulnerability? What if I don’t do a good job? There’s fear there and sense of unworthiness because we don’t we don’t know who we are. And a sense of shame, it’s all my fault. And certainly anger and resentment when people don’t do the anger and resentment when people don’t reciprocate. And then there’s a sense of muddied emotion, you just muddied emotion. You just can’t quite. Understand what you’re feeling, because there’s so much there and you’re not really able to attend very well because you’ve shut yourself out of your body and out of your emotions.

Michelle [00:19:54]

Yeah, and I one of the things I really love that you’re saying that is we just don’t know who we are. Yeah. You know, that’s so much of our attention has gone toward other people. What you know, this sort of hyper vigilance on hyperfocus on, you know, what’s happening with them, what do they need, what will make them happy, what you know, and not enough attention on ourselves. So we don’t know who we are.

Miki [00:20:21]

Yeah. Yeah.

Michelle [00:20:23]

And does that. You know, does that create some problems in relationships, this I don’t know who I am, this focus on the other to the exclusion of ourselves?

Miki [00:20:35]

Yeah, there’s you know, the whole. The whole. The whole people pleasing complex, if you will, that sounds kind of clinical, but I didn’t know what else to call it. When you’re doing something, you’re doing everything for the other person and the other person, just letting it happen, then there becomes this huge imbalance. And there’s an unspoken contract that if I do this, then you’re supposed to do that back for me. And the other part of the contract is you’re going to do everything and I don’t have to do a darn thing.

Michelle [00:21:19]

The on the for the other person, you mean?

Miki [00:21:20]

Yeah,

Michelle [00:21:21]

Yeah, so so there’s this unspoken contract that I’ll do everything for you. And then on the other side, they think, I don’t have to do anything for my partner, but you’re saying I’ll do everything for you and then you’ll do something for me. What is that something you think?

Miki [00:21:42]

Well. Being nice, being being nice, being kind, right, that you recognize, yes, recognizing that your partner would say, oh, thank you, honey, or would do a kindness back to you or start taking care of some of the things in the household. And it doesn’t happen because they don’t have to!

Michelle [00:22:05]

Right. Or maybe is it even beyond being kind maybe that they’ll just love you and you’ll finally feel worthy?

Miki [00:22:13]

Yeah, yeah. And there’s such an imbalance. And I remember I’m going to tell the story. I don’t know if you put it in here and it doesn’t matter either way for me. I remember I remember in the 70s I was going to school full time and working full time. And I got home and my husband was sitting on the couch watching something on TV and the house was a mess. And I finally kind of had enough. And I started saying, why don’t you do anything around here? And I was I was feeling really angry. And he started he literally started laughing at me.

Michelle [00:22:54]

Well, that didn’t help the anger, did it?

Miki [00:22:57]

OOH wee! Yeah, and I was flabbergasted. I’m not sure why I should have been flabbergasted because what else would you expect? He was trained. You know, he was trained and we always avoided conflict. It was. And that’s kind of an unspoken thing. I’m not quite sure why now, but, you know, and why I chose to say in that moment. Why don’t you get your rear end off the couch and do something around this house? That was. Unheard of. And there I was creating conflict, and that was really scary. So,

Michelle [00:23:40]

Yeah, really scary, but I also get the sense that maybe there was some freedom in it, too.

Miki [00:23:46]

Oh, absolutely.

Michelle [00:23:49]

Yeah, yeah. Wow.

Miki [00:23:51]

And then of course, when he laughed, I didn’t know what to do with that.

Michelle [00:23:55]

What did you do with that, Miki?

Miki [00:23:58]

Uh. I think I yelled at him, I don’t quite remember the name quite remember the rest of the story. I think I’m kind of glad about that!

Michelle [00:24:10]

But it sounds like this was, you know, kind of an awakening movement for you, a turning point. And sometimes it’s like that for us. There’s something really uncomfortable that happens, but that begins to change the course of events, begins to change the direction of our own lives and of our relationship.

Miki [00:24:30]

Yeah. You know, I didn’t put this together with that event, but it wasn’t long after that that I became very vocal about. What are you going to do? Are you going to do this and kind of not demanding but saying you need to do this? And I we went to dinner with his parents at his parents house, and I told his father, why don’t you get in there and help her do the dishes? And he looked at me. He said, “you save your own marriage” Because here was this poor woman who worked full time, raise three kids. Of course her kids were adults by then, but she did everything and was just this most deferential woman, you know, one of the models of behavior for, you know, young women of that age. So.

Michelle [00:25:24]

Right. And that was the you know, that was the model at that time, right? Yeah. And women did everything at home. Yeah.

Miki [00:25:32]

Yeah.

Michelle [00:25:33]

Wow. Yeah. Wow. So, yeah. So there was this imbalance and there was this turning point, but then things shifted.

Miki [00:25:44]

Yeah they did.

Michelle [00:25:45]

How did that happen? I how did you come to start knowing yourself in that way, you know?

Miki [00:25:54]

You know, I don’t know that I did. The thing that I knew was that I couldn’t take it anymore.

Michelle [00:26:02]

Yeah,

Miki [00:26:03]

I just couldn’t take it anymore.

Michelle [00:26:06]

I’m sure so many people can relate to that.

Miki [00:26:08]

Yeah, I just came to a point I wasn’t meditating. I didn’t have any of that in my life at that time. It was a few years after that that I. Quit my job as a CPA. I went back to school to become a therapist and that was kind of serendipitous, but in that period between the being laughed at and then there was an increased. Ability to say, I’m not doing all of this.

Michelle [00:26:40]

Mm hmm.

Miki [00:26:41]

Yeah, and. I think you just get sick of it.

Michelle [00:26:47]

Yeah,

Miki [00:26:48]

And people, of course, have different levels of tolerance, right? Yeah,

Michelle [00:26:52]

Right. Although I think the more. Let’s say stressful, our environment was that people pleasing came out of the higher tolerance for dealing with it, like we’ve built this really strong muscle for I can survive, I can survive not mattering, you know. Yeah.

Miki [00:27:16]

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Michelle [00:27:19]

So one of the things I love about your book is that you really kind of lay out this scaffolding for how we begin to see ourselves again, how we begin to uncover what you call our inner loveliness.

Miki [00:27:43]

In the book, I go through in various chapters and talk about thoughts and feelings and the body, which is where we hold a lot of stress and a lot of hurt and how to reconnect, in some sense, it’s like coming home to ourselves through mindfulness. And one of the things that I ended up liking about the book was that there were a lot of informal practices in addition to practicing mindfulness meditation in and having various mindfulness meditations. Suggested, but there are also a whole series of. Informal practice that you can do in the in the moment, things that you can explore and contemplate.

Michelle [00:28:31]

Yeah, I think people may not know that when you’re talking about formal practice, we’re talking about really what we think of as meditation. You set aside time separately. You’re not doing anything else. You’re doing this just this practice. But informal is when we’re not separating ourselves from our lives. But as we’re going about our lives, we’re tending to things in this particular way.

Miki [00:28:55]

Yes. Yes. Like we simply notice the moment we take a breath and we get into this, we get present in the moment in a friendly way to ourselves. And notice when most of the time we’re not here, and that’s when our reactivity is there.

Michelle [00:29:17]

So this bit you just said, we get present in a friendly way toward ourselves in the moment, toward ourselves. That’s I think that’s the heart of it, right. This this being disconnected from ourselves when we the remedy, so to speak, is to learn to be present to ourselves in a friendly way, moment by moment by moment.

Miki [00:29:41]

Yeah. And that is a work of a lifetime.

Michelle [00:29:45]

Indeed it is.

Miki [00:29:47]

So whenever I whenever I suggest something, I say this takes time. And I don’t want that to discourage anyone, but also to I don’t want that to discourage anyone, but to give them the courage to know that. When they meditate, it’s not going to be perfect and they’re not going to clear their mind altogether and all of those things that people think make them not a good meditator, but that it takes time and you can move. Move with the practice, with compassion. Like having compassion for our compassion for our for a mindfulness practice.

Michelle [00:30:27]

Yeah, and this just this it takes time, in other words, it’s not there there’s it’s not about being perfect, which, of course, with people pleasing is such a you know, and it’s going to the heart of it. Let me be perfect. And then you’ll love me, right?

Miki [00:30:45]

Of course. Yeah. So so it’s wonderful that mindfulness can actually help us know that.

Michelle [00:30:53]

Right, and to accept the fact, the truth, the reality that we are not perfect and we cannot be perfect.

Miki [00:31:04]

Yeah,

Michelle [00:31:05]

And yet I like the phrase perfectly imperfect.

Miki [00:31:10]

Yes, yes. And I don’t know who who said this, but. Now, hold on, I need to I need to grab the quote. “You’re perfect the way you are, and things could stand a little improvement.”

Michelle [00:31:26]

Exactly. I love that one too. Yeah, yeah. That’s wonderful. Yeah.

Miki [00:31:34]

So this mindfulness practice can be really powerful and. You know, there are all sorts of classes in it, or you can kind of start on your start by yourself either way, but I do know that having a group to practice with is really important and. Wish we had time to do a meditation with people, but that doesn’t probably fit in this time frame.

Miki [00:32:28]

And one of the things I think about mindfulness is that has been so powerful for me is that, you know, you if you read about if you read about mindfulness and there are lists of ten of this and eight of that people can cultivate. And then there’s the short list, which I always like a short list of the four heart qualities and that those heart qualities of loving kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity are are developed through the practice of mindfulness. And that they also there’s their. Specific meditations for living for those four heart qualities and. 

Lovingkindness has been a big one for me, and that’s kind of where a lot of my inspiration has come from, from the for the for both of these books, actually.

Michelle [00:33:23]

Yeah, it’s been a big one for me, too. And I was just going to ask you if you want to say a little bit about your children’s book, May all people and pigs be happy. One of the things that I love about it is. You know, I when I get younger people in my practice, I no longer work with kids, but when I get younger people in my practice, when I get people in their 20s, let’s say, and they learn things like self compassion, I’m so excited because I think, wow, how would my life have been different if I learned that really at age, you know? And and so this book May all People and Pigs Be Happy really is teaching that those heart qualities. For at a very young age,

Miki [00:34:09]

Yes. Yes, the book is for the book is for kids between three and eight years old, and it’s a story that the meditation of my of loving kindness is taught through it in the form of a story. And the story goes that there’s a little girl named Claire who’s named after my goddaughter and. A stuffed pig and I actually have a stuffed pig named Pig Allena, so pig Allena is Claire’s stuffed pig and of course the pig is alive to her. And whenever there are certain circumstances in Claire’s life, she teaches loving kindness. And in the traditional, buddhist world, loving kindness is is practiced by saying a series of well wishes. Or lovingkindness statements we or our prayers or blessings get people think of him as different and that the and then it goes in a in a series, first it’s may I be safe, Maggie? And there could those statements can change, but it goes from May I to me, a loved one may a familiar stranger, may a difficult person and may all people. Well all people and all pigs may all beings.

Michelle [00:35:34]

Right.

Miki [00:35:35]

Yeah. And so it goes through that full range of loving kindness and. I’m I’m still in love with it.

Michelle [00:35:46]

I’m in love with it, too, and both the story itself and the way you laid that out, but also the beautiful illustrations.

Miki [00:35:54]

Yeah, my husband illustrated it, John, Pavlicek, And he’s a he was an illustrator years and years ago, and he’s been in a collage artist for as a career for over, I don’t know, forty five years or so. And he agreed to. Illustrate it, and actually at first it was just, you know, would you mind drawing a picture of this? And then we went, well, duh, we can, we can he can illustrate it. Yeah.

Michelle [00:36:24]

Oh, that’s wonderful. I just I really love that. And I hope that people pick up the book and read it to their children and their godchildren and their grandchildren and their neighborhood children and all of that. So it gives us a sense it starts to give us a sense of how we can begin to turn our attention toward ourselves with kindness, with well wishes. And you’ve talked a little bit about how that begins to free us, right? That we. Yes. And to see ourselves, we begin to take ourselves seriously, to be able to say, I don’t want to do all the work. Yeah. I’d like you to do some of the work. Right. Yeah. How does that impact. Ah, you know, you talked a little bit about training the other person, training your husband, that he didn’t have to do anything. 

So how does recovery, let’s say, from people pleasing. How does that actually benefit our partner in our relationship as well? Hmm? Because I think there may be a little hesitation, like, please don’t stop people pleasing. I like that you do all the cleaning!

Miki [00:37:36]

I know. Yes. And I think that that when as you move from chronic people pleasing into. Opening to yourself and opening to the difficulties in that that it causes. There can be some conflict, yeah, in any relationship there is, and part of chronic people pleasing is I’m staying out of conflict. I’ll do anything not to do that. So there is some. There is some. There is a challenge to that. And in the book there, there are lots of things that are that is excuse me, there are a lot of things that I suggest that people practice. 

And first off, having a practice of mindfulness can actually help us to. We react instead of respond so that our reaction to. Someone’s pushback, you know, maybe our spouses push back, our partners push back. Can help to alleviate even more conflict. By acting with compassion, by not overreacting, by not judging or letting go of judgment, we’re all going to judge. And so that the practice itself, getting your rear end on the cushion, so to speak, can help us to to do that, to respond instead of react. And it may be that the spouse can be invited to join with the join with that practice. 

And. This comes from Thich Nat Han, I think there’s a really powerful thing that he suggests, which is what she calls a peace treaty, where when something happens, that’s of when there’s a conflict that happens, that the person who is upset can say, I need to talk about something. Can we set a time so that both both people can have some time to. Not get rid of their feelings or squash them, but to open to their feelings and to process them in a way that is friendly, compassionate, and allowing. And that way, then some of that emotion gets softened some.

Michelle [00:40:12]

Mm hmm.

Miki [00:40:13]

And you’re able to speak sanely.

Michelle [00:40:15]

Mm hmm.

Miki [00:40:16]

Instead of, like, going off the handle, which could I mean, you know, that’s a possibility in any relationship. Right?

Michelle [00:40:24]

Right.

Miki [00:40:25]

And so there’s that there’s that setting time aside. And then there’s some very specific. Instructions about the peace treaty and some of it akin to what Harville Hendrix talks about in the intentional dialog, know if you’ve ever reviewed that in, but that’s something to to look at, to use I statements, less judgment and then. We don’t have to go into that, but there are ways of communicating that can help us and there they are, simple but not easy.

Michelle [00:41:03]

Yeah, and, you know, in the Compassion For Couples program, we look at communication. And one of the things we look at is that the words we use are such a small, small fraction of what we communicate.

Miki [00:41:17]

Oh, yes.

Michelle [00:41:17]

So that when we can, as you’re pointing to here, when we can cultivate the capacity to be in a warm hearted state, when we’re communicating the that that comes through, when we’re communicating from a place of threat or threat defense or trying to improve the other person that comes through that message comes through regardless of the words, even if we’re using the same words. So I really love how you’re talking about preparing ourselves through our own mindfulness practice, but then preparing ourselves through setting a time and actually sitting or whatever we might need to do to help us open our hearts in that kind of way before we begin to talk about a conflict.

Miki [00:42:04]

Yeah, and maybe it maybe it’s lovingkindness practice. Yeah. For ourselves and for the other person. And one of the things that I think is, is an interesting practice is this sense of. Receiving and radiating love and compassion, and we can work with the breath to maybe there’s a conflict and it’s a really difficult one to call to mind all of our teachers, all of our loved ones, like almost not literally call them, but call into our inner presence, all of those people who support us and to call their love to feel their love and then to breathe it out to those people. And so there’s a sense of being able to feel supported.

Michelle [00:42:57]

Yeah.

Miki [00:42:58]

And that that is a calming factor, I think, and then to. It’s possible then to breathe in your. Partners love or excuse me, breathe in their difficulty. I’ll start that over again, it’s possible to then breathe in your partner’s difficulty and breathe out whatever you think that person needs. It might be love. It might be a sense of. There is an inner goodness, you know, who knows what the person needs, but if if it’s your if it’s your partner, you probably have a sense of what that might be. And so using the breath to to. Receive love and support and then send it out and then with the Tonglen practice of receiving someone your own pain.

Michelle [00:43:55]

Yeah.

Miki [00:43:56]

And breathing out one of those, the signs for me and my physical body has over time has been lots of tension in my body. And so breathing and tension and breathing out ease or kindness or whatever, you think that tension needs to soften and then also breathing in other people’s maybe your partner’s pain. You know, he got his feelings hurt and he burst out at me.

Michelle [00:44:21]

Right, right, right. There’s a little more acceptance of our partner not being perfect, but we can accept ourselves as not being perfect. Yeah. That this awareness this is kind of the shared human condition. Yeah. I love the way you’re really describing how having our own practice, tending to our needs can help us be present with our partner. And I think that’s one of the differences. Right. That’s one of the benefits in relationship. When we’re a people pleasing, we’re not actually in the relationship.

Miki [00:44:54]

Right.

Michelle [00:44:54]

The real true person is not there. But when we bring ourselves into the relationship, even if there’s conflict at first, we now actually create the possibility of intimacy in our relationship. We can know ourselves and know our partner. And we can feel connected and we can feel loved, even though that means that we we will likely have to face conflict from time to time.

Miki [00:45:21]

Yeah, it’s inherent. Yeah. I mean, we can’t think we don’t think the same all the time. I mean, even when you’re even when you’re fairly well suited for each other. There’s conflict,

Michelle [00:45:32]

Of course.

Miki [00:45:33]

Yeah. And one another thing about mindfulness, I think that is important is that we start looking at our own perceptions and how those perceptions get in the way of of our relationship flourishing like. You can have control wanting to be wanting to be right and. Maybe we’re not right. Maybe it doesn’t have to be the way we think it needs to be. And we start seeing ourselves with greater sense of reality and kindness and our partners as well, and we can see like what was I thinking about this person?

Michelle [00:46:17]

I love it, it’s you know, I like the concept of toxic certainty, right? And so this is really an antidote to toxic toxic search.

Miki [00:46:27]

Yeah, I like that toxic certainty. So kind of hard to say. Toxic, certainly. Yes. Say that 20 times.

Michelle [00:46:35]

Exactly. Maybe I’m not right at this. A little open-mindedness to go with the openheartedness. Miki, I’m so enjoying talking to you.

Miki [00:46:48]

I’m enjoying talking with you.

Michelle [00:46:50]

But is there anything else that you want to say or you want to talk about? There doesn’t have to be I just want to make space. I think it’s been lovely already.

Miki [00:47:00]

I do too, I. As I was writing the book, the thing that I came to is. Opening to our inner what I call our inner loveliness. And when that begins to happen. It softens everything.

Michelle [00:47:23]

Yeah.

Miki [00:47:24]

And also, you can’t force it.

Michelle [00:47:31]

Yeah, that’s important.

Miki [00:47:32]

You can’t force it.

Michelle [00:47:33]

You can’t force it, it’s sort of like a seed in the garden. I’ve seen pictures of your beautiful garden. You can’t force it. Yeah, yeah. Provide the fertilizer. Water it. Give it, sun. But you can’t force it.

Miki [00:47:48]

Yeah, it’ll grow in its time.

Michelle [00:47:50]

It’ll grow in its time. Exactly.

Miki [00:47:52]

Absolutely. Well, the book is is full of all sorts of practices that you can do, right in the heart of your day, that can address some of the people pleasing so and. I actually read this book or reviewed it for the first time in quite a while when I knew we were going to talk about it and I actually enjoyed it.

Michelle [00:48:20]

Yeah, I did, too. I reread it before we talked and there’s so much good stuff in it. Miki, I really just loved.

Miki [00:48:27]

Glad you liked it. Yeah. And I’m and I hope it’s helpful for people. It’s it comes from my heart in my own experience and. It was helpful for me to write it. Yeah, probably helpful for me than anyone else.

Michelle [00:48:42]

No, I don’t think so. I don’t think so. Think it’s a guide for people along the path, so.

Miki [00:48:49]

Oh, right.

Michelle [00:48:50]

Anyway, well, Miki, thank you so much for being with us today.

Miki [00:48:54]

So happy to be here.

Michelle [00:48:56]

It’s been such a pleasure to talk with you. If you would like to know more about the programs that Miki offers, you can find her on her website, Living Mindfully dot org. If you want to know more about her work with people pleasing, I highly recommend her book, The Need to Please — Mindfulness Skills to gain freedom from people pleasing and Approval Seeking. And for kids and adults everywhere I go and for kids and adults everywhere. She has written a most delightful book about how to be, how to develop the capacity to meet difficulty with heartfulness, called May All People and Pigs Be Happy. It’s a favorite of mine. 

So that’s all for today’s Well Connected Relationships podcast. Thanks for being here. If you’d like to get our notes on the highlights of this episode, along with a simple practice you can use for relationship problems instead of falling into the rut of people pleasing, be sure to join our well connected relationships community on the Wise Compassion website. I’ve got so much more in store for you, so be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss a thing.