Disappointing Others

Disappointing another human being is one of the hardest feelings in the world for me to deal with. The shame and guilt I put on myself for making someone else feel any type of way except happy weights heavy on my shoulders. I’m terrible at being at peace with disappointing others to invest time into myself, but it’s currently the skill I’m working on developing the most.

Being a people pleaser, empath, or whatever you want to call it, is a sick cycle. The fear of disappointing others leads to you overcommitting. That overcommitment leads to higher expectations from you and others. The overcommitment, higher expectations, and lack of time in the day lead you back to the driving force behind it all, disappointment. You’ve spread yourself too thin, and created greater disappointment because you were afraid of the repercussions of saying “no”, or “I can’t today".

The people you are so worried about disappointing will understand you prioritizing yourself or whatever you want to do. Be cognizant of the people who make you feel guilty for doing what you want every once in a while. These relationships may be preventing you from striding closer to the best version of yourself. You may also need to evaluate the relationship you have with your own self. Ask yourself WHY you put shame and guilt on yourself when you feel as if you’re disappointing others? Ask yourself WHY prioritizing yourself doesn’t come as easily as the inhibition to think about others?

You need to set aside time to do what you want. Plan something. It could be as simple as just going on walk, going fishing, painting, having a conversation with an old friend. Just think about something that provides you pure joy, and go do it, even if it doesn’t leave time for you to make someone else happy.