Why It Doesn't Pay to Be a People Pleaser

Pleasing people most definitely pays. That is how the world works; you give people what they want, and you get paid. Supply and demand.

Preachers of self-reliance seem to confuse "not letting other people affect you" and "not caring about other people".

Self-reliance and people-pleasing are two separate axes on a Cartesian plane. You can be both self-reliant and people-pleasing.

Being self-reliant, but not people-pleasing is trivial. If you isolate yourself, there is nobody to rely on!

In the same vein, it's easy to be moral and idealistic when alone. The real test is with real people, and whether you are still able to keep those ideals.

Wield both: self-reliance and people-pleasing. Then you will be a force to be reckoned with.

EDIT: Talking about truth and white lie as a dichotomy is childish. They are tools in a toolbox. If you feel guilty because you lied, then you are a slave to the principle of honesty. If you are thinking about which (truth or white lie) is better for the relationship, then you are a master in command of both principles.

And yet the karma mechanism on HN and other social networking websites biases users into toeing the line of what is the 'general view'. The view of course changes considerably over time which shows it is mostly about mood or values.

There has got to be a better regulation mechanism than '+1' and the received wisdom.

Interesting. Slightly left-field here, but people with autistic spectrum disorders are often considered to be prone to depression, often because of social anxiety, but this would suggest the opposite is also true, as ASD sufferers generally tend to care less what other people think of them.

From personal experience, as someone whose family and friends reckon is firmly "on the spectrum", I tend to be naturally open and honest in a work environment, showing my emotions, being honest about problems and not (consciously at any rate) trying to please anyone, and I think I'm pretty happy most of the time. And on those few times that I have made social mistakes, for instance saying something out of place in a new job, I become very tense and totally incapable of focusing, which makes me glad that I don't care most of the time.

Convincing people to buy stuff they don't need is very common road to wealth.

The author defines people pleasing:

> People pleasing, in my extensive personal experience, is a process of guessing what other people want, or what will make them think favorably of us, and then acting accordingly.

People pleasing isn't caring about other people. It's being selfish and manipulative in interactions with other people (often without realizing it). Quite the opposite.