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How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

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Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#221

Post by FooBarBizBazz »

momokoko wrote: post #188

The whole make yourself happy first mentality is a bizarre side effect of therapy. Therapists have one client. Not the client’s family, friends, coworkers, and community. Because of that much of the advice therapist give benefits the client at the expense of everyone else. This creates a toxic environment when you have a large percentage of any group going to therapy and practicing me first techniques. I wonder if th…

In the best/ideal case, that's one of the jobs of a pastor/rabbi/imam. Their purpose, to now use Christian language, is to care for their flock. This does mean being concerned with the spiritual needs of the individual. But it also means being concerned with the larger community.

You can imagine those goals being in conflict. The norms that help communities to grow and find new life are not necessarily the norms that help individuals find fulfilment. For example, heteronormativity helps the biological reproduction of the community, and generally is good for the happiness of the majority, but it sucks for LGBTQ people. It's natural, therefore, for there to be a backlash against it. But it seems to me that the solution is really to recognize the roles that people of all sexual preferences can play in ensuring the community's biological, ecological, and cultural future. In this way, norms related to fertility can be reconciled with those about truth-to-self, in a way that is actually functional.

(Note that if 20% of the community has a non-reproductive role to play, and a birth rate of 2.1 is required to maintain the community, then a birth rate of 2.6 is required among the 80% of heterosexuals, which is perfectly reasonable. As some percentage of those will probably remain single -- 20%? -- then really only about 64% of women can be expected to have children, in which case the expected value needs to be about 3.3 -- still fine. An alternative is to make up for low reproductive rates by proselytizing, but I think a permanent culture needs to exist at an equilibrium. If gene/meme incentives are not aligned, everyone will need to wage a constant war against their own selves (various kinds of "pray the gay away" and other mutilations), which is exactly what we are trying to avoid.)

All this is meant simply as an example of how, although shifting from therapist-of-the-individual to shepherd-of-the-community could be anticipated to advance different (and possibly problematic) norms, it is probably possible to resolve those norm-conflicts in a way that is productive, i.e., that respects and values all individuals while also propagating a sustainable, non-parasitic culture.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#222

Post by liquid_bluing »

yowlingcat wrote: post #171
Razengan wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is one of the main reasons why I prefer living in big cities. Big Cities also amplify loneliness and make it more crushing when you just keep getting lost in the crowd. Concrete jungles with more traffic than trees are also a depressing drain upon the soul. My ideal sweet spot is Small Towns near a Big City that you can dip into once every weekend or so.

You just succinctly described why I decided to dip out of a big city into exurbia when the pandemic started. I figured that if I'm going to be lonely, I may as well do it in nature. Turns out that being alone in nature (as I realized in college) actually doesn't make me feel lonely. This is going to sound kinda weird, but I actually feel a sense of togetherness and belonging being near trees, dense foliage, animals.…

I've noticed this as well. Just the thought of being alone in a quiet forest with the sounds of the leaves rustling and the birds chirping, and the smell of the conifers puts me in a relaxed state of mind. I've noticed also that my mind almost reflexively anthropomorphizes the organisms around me, and I have a nebulous hypothesis as to why this is.

Consider this: those who become blind later in life often experience visual hallucinations (Charles Bonnet syndrome). It seems like there is something like a vision module in the brain which, when under-stimulated, starts producing its own content.

Maybe we have a social module as well, which, when under-stimulated by social interaction, starts hallucinating that non-human objects and organisms have human sentiments, and we feel a sense of affiliation as we might toward a human. The happy difference is that there is never a risk of negative social feedback from trees, rocks, or chipmunks, in the same way that there is a low risk of negative social feedback from very young children or kindly old ladies, toward whom I at least also tend to feel a reflexive sense of affiliation.

Thus, the feeling of togetherness we experience in nature is a result of our hallucinating social agents that never give us negative social feedback.

Moreover, exercise and the outdoors make you feel energetic and refreshed for other reasons, and when you feel good, the threshold stimulus for affiliative feeling is certainly lower.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#223

Post by [deleted] »

dannyw wrote: post #103
cheschire wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What has your recent experience been as these opportunities arise in the face of COVID? How does the potential for danger in even mundane social gatherings affect your decision now? In the last 18 months I came to the same conclusion as you and started socializing more, but then COVID happened and then quarantine and while the rest of my office rushes back to doing team lunches and whatnot, I find myself hesitating.…

I think you should consider the actual quantified risk to you and the community. For someone living alone for example and going to work drinks with 5 people, your risk of contracting COVID is very small. Your chance of developing serious complications from COVID is also very small. Your chance of spreading COVID to others, should you isolate once you develop symptoms, is also small. I highly recommend you research th…

[deleted]

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#224

Post by pc86 »

jgwil2 wrote: post #184
pc86 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it is the norm to be fired on the spot and without recourse for something that has nothing to do with your job You're going to have to prove that it's the norm because it's never happened to me, or anyone I have ever interacted with. In a country of 350 million people you can pull out half a dozen examples of anything. But please point me to a single peer-reviewed study that shows it's normal or expected to be fire…

I don't think the parent means it is the norm for this to happen to most people, but rather that at-will employment[0] is the norm and this is a possibility, however remote, that most people have to reckon with. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

There is quite a bit of difference between "it is the norm to be fired on the spot and without recourse for something that has nothing to do with your job" (a direct quote, I don't believe missing any context but open to counterarguments) and "a legal framework exists in which a thing could conceivably happen, even though it doesn't happen in any statistically significant numbers"

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#225

Post by oceanplexian »

cheschire wrote: post #88
closeparen wrote: post #29

My life got a lot better after I stopped considering questions in terms of my own preferences and started considering them in terms of how they would connect me to others. I really don’t want to go out for drinks after work. But this preference is nothing compared to how much I value the friendships that come from doing it. Hiking a mountain is not in the top 100 things I want to do with my weekend. But a shared expe…

What has your recent experience been as these opportunities arise in the face of COVID? How does the potential for danger in even mundane social gatherings affect your decision now? In the last 18 months I came to the same conclusion as you and started socializing more, but then COVID happened and then quarantine and while the rest of my office rushes back to doing team lunches and whatnot, I find myself hesitating.…

> How does the potential for danger in even mundane social gatherings affect your decision now?

I assess the risk with the same way I assessed the combined cumulative risk of the last 4-5 Flu Seasons. In that it didn't affect my behavior or choices in any way whatsoever. The problem is while I'd like to socialize and get back to normal, unelected health department officials have decided to make socialization illegal.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#226

Post by groby_b »

dannyw wrote: post #103
cheschire wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What has your recent experience been as these opportunities arise in the face of COVID? How does the potential for danger in even mundane social gatherings affect your decision now? In the last 18 months I came to the same conclusion as you and started socializing more, but then COVID happened and then quarantine and while the rest of my office rushes back to doing team lunches and whatnot, I find myself hesitating.…

I think you should consider the actual quantified risk to you and the community. For someone living alone for example and going to work drinks with 5 people, your risk of contracting COVID is very small. Your chance of developing serious complications from COVID is also very small. Your chance of spreading COVID to others, should you isolate once you develop symptoms, is also small. I highly recommend you research th…

"how little risk it poses to people our age."

You know the age of everybody on HN? And that also ignores the risk of long covid, and the risk of serious harm.

And even for young people, the risk is nothing to sneeze at (pardon the pun). See e.g. Penn State's Athletics department numbers of a 15% infection rate on their football team: https://www.centredaily.com/sports/college/penn-state-univer...

Worse, many of those infected in that particular group have rather alarming levels of myocarditis. Their age didn't spare them.

That doesn't mean we should be all "we're doomed", but glibly dismissing the risk isn't helpful either.

And while you personally might be at a lesser risk, everybody you interact with now inherits your risk. (Pre- and asymptomatic spread is a thing, isolation is not a panacea). So at the very least, include your contacts in your risk calculation. You want to see your parents and not risk killing them? Your bar of risk you can take is lower.

You spend your time exclusively with the same 5 people, in a lower age bracket, and none of them venture outside that bubble? Sure, your risk is much lower. But few of us are in a non-family bubble of 5 people who don't see anybody else.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#227

Post by Loughla »

jasode wrote: post #175
Loughla wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's important to sit down and decide what we want out of life I always get my hair up with this kind of statement. How do your goals look? Because the only goals I have are: a) not be homeless, b) not have my family die, and c) figure out how to have someone give me ten million dollars so I can stop coming to work. People who have specific, 'work-ish' goals in their personal lives sort of weird me out. I don't know…

>How do your goals look? Because the only goals I have are: a) not be homeless, b) not have my family die, and c) [...] >People who have specific, 'work-ish' goals in their personal lives sort of weird me out. I'm genuinely confused as to what actually bothers you about "work-ish" goals. As another example, I used to have a boring (but very high paying) business consulting job. I hated getting on an airplane every si…

>"work-ish" goals.

I meant that not as goals related to work things - but instead, I meant that as in specific, actionable goals in your personal life. For example - "Before October 25th I will 'x' and Before November 3rd, I will 'x' and in the end I will see 'y' return for 'z' money by December 3rd" sort of formal, timelined and official goals.

It's just weird to me to think about a strategic planning process for a home life, I guess.

Does that make sense?

I think you answered my question - your goals/sitting down and planning out your life are sort of what I do, in a way that I would argue is not super goal driven.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#228

Post by tristor »

ritchiea wrote: post #205
tristor wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free speech is a philosophical concept, it happens to be enshrined in law in the 1st Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America to prevent the government for imprisoning you for your speech, but it is first and foremost the philosophical concept, not the law. That concept used to be part of the social mores of the United States and much of the Western world, it isn't really any longer as your own c…

You clearly have a narrow view of the history of the United States because before the 1960's a black person could be murdered by a mob for saying the wrong thing to a white person. And those mob murderers would not be prosecuted. You call that a philosophical protection of free speech inshrined within the culture? Also, you ever hear of anyone in America being punished for saying they're a communist or homosexual? Or…

> To any degree free speech was a thing, it was most often selectively afforded to white men.

This is true, and unsurprising given the historical context. In fact, the Constitution was written as such with the original intention of providing those freedoms primarily to the benefit of not just white men, but land-owning white men. Crofters, smallholders, and other types of land-owners wanted to be put on the same tier of political power as others, when previously they were stifled under the aristocracy. That was the defining feature of the American Revolution and the things which followed.

But your reply to me is primarily just a form of whataboutism and fails to refute or respond to my core point. My view of history is neither narrow nor incomplete, insofar as it applies to the racial and gender injustices that existed in the US. This also has pretty much nothing to do with the philosophical basis of free speech.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#229

Post by tshaddox »

mikem170 wrote: post #219
cheschire wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What has your recent experience been as these opportunities arise in the face of COVID? How does the potential for danger in even mundane social gatherings affect your decision now? In the last 18 months I came to the same conclusion as you and started socializing more, but then COVID happened and then quarantine and while the rest of my office rushes back to doing team lunches and whatnot, I find myself hesitating.…

I've been getting together with friends and family more the last couple/few months. Outdoors and indoors. A couple/few larger gatherings. There have been no problems. Most of us our in our 40s and 50s - some older, some younger. We don't sneeze or cough on each other. It is assumed that someone feeling sick would stay home. Our family is more careful around gram, she's 92. I'm personally not of the belief that covid…

In the United States, 100,000 people died in the 1968 flu season, and the US population was about 200 million. There have been 200,000 COVID-19 deaths, and the US population is 328 million.

Re: How to say no, for the people pleaser who always says yes

#230

Post by [deleted] »

pc86 wrote: post #224
jgwil2 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the parent means it is the norm for this to happen to most people, but rather that at-will employment[0] is the norm and this is a possibility, however remote, that most people have to reckon with. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

There is quite a bit of difference between " it is the norm to be fired on the spot and without recourse for something that has nothing to do with your job" (a direct quote, I don't believe missing any context but open to counterarguments) and "a legal framework exists in which a thing could conceivably happen, even though it doesn't happen in any statistically significant numbers"

[deleted]
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