Why Just Say It Exists.

It took multiple painful breakups to see what people pleasing was costing me, and that I needed to change.

At 36, it was second nature. I come from a family of people pleasers, in a town of people pleasers, in a culture of people pleasing.

I was lonely, had low self-esteem, and I felt like nobody actually knew the real me.

So I read all the books and watched every YouTube video I could find. I became an expert on the problem. But put me in a real situation and I fell back on the same habits. Nothing changed.

Things finally shifted when I started writing down the situations where I’d been a people pleaser, and what I should have said instead. I was already doing this in my head, on repeat. Now it was a log instead of an unhealthy inner monologue.

Then I started reading it out loud, mostly as a release after yet another conversation where I didn’t say what I meant.

“The line starts back there.”

“That really hurt my feelings.”

“I’m not comfortable with that.”

“No.”

They got easier to say, so I said them more often. I had the words, and more importantly, the muscle memory to use them in the moment.

Just Say It is everything I learned (the common scenarios, what people pleasing looks like, and what to say instead), turned into a practice to help you make the change. Hopefully faster than I did.

I’m not perfect. I still catch myself people pleasing now and then, but I’m a whole helluva lot better at 40 than I was when I started this journey.