How To Stop People Pleasing & Start Prioritizing Yourself & Your Own Happiness w/ Kathryn Flashner

People-pleasing is feeling overly concerned with pleasing others and earning their approval as a way to maintain relationships. It’s prioritizing others' reactions of what you do and say, and how you show up. It’s doing things because you fear rejection or want the approval of others in order to feel like you’re enough. Being a concerned and caring person is an important part of maintaining healthy relationships with loved ones. I believe the challenge arises when you are pursuing the happiness of others at the expense of your own emotional well-being and happiness. People-pleasers often hide their own needs, preferences, desires, and beliefs in order to accommodate other people. This can make it feel as if you are not living your life authentically and it may even leave you feeling as if you don’t know yourself at all. In this episode, my friend Kathryn Flashner and I dive into the concept of people-pleasing and how it has personally kept us disconnected from our authenticity and happiness in the past. We talk about the importance of honoring your authenticity and making it your first priority, instead of overriding it to please others and pursue their happiness. We also chat about how vital it is to give ourselves the space to actually define who we are, what we really want, and what makes us feel the most alive if we want to live a life of personal freedom, joy, and peace — and we give you space to do so in this episode if you choose. We share steps you can take today to stop people-pleasing, if you’re a recovering people pleaser like me.Kathryn’s north star is storytelling, and she cares deeply about establishing real connections with each community she serves. She has recently relocated to Los Angeles and is the VP of Licensing at Hello Sunshine, a company whose mission is to change the narrative for women. Outside of this role, Kathryn is a meditation and yoga teacher, who sees immense opportunity to infuse mindfulness practices into our corporate settings. She is also an actor and hosts a podcast called The Truth Is, which is dedicated to building a world where we all feel safe and empowered to step into and speak our truth- at home, at work, and in all facets of our lives. Resources:Learn more about fight, flight, freeze, and fawn, our bodily reactions to stressful, frightening, or dangerous events, here.Listen to Kathryn's Podcast The Truth Is on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.Connect with Kathryn on Instagram @kathrynflaschner or @thetruthis__podcast.Connect with me @lucca_petrucci on Instagram or TikTok.This episode was produced by Lucca Petrucci and mixed and mastered by Joel Yoshonis.