Frankly, my dear, I'm tired of giving a damn
Confessions of a recovering people pleaser
"Ishi, can you please—," my friend’s voice was drowned out by a sudden thunderclap from the backseat of our 16-seater clown car, barreling towards a picnic spot in Goa's mental monsoons.
"Yeah, hold on, I'll PLAY SOME JAZZ FOR YOU" I shouted back, my voice competing with winds beating against the window. I pounced on my phone, giddy with the intoxicating high of being useful. I pulled up my carefully curated jazz playlist – and hit play on the most intellectual track I could find.
Minutes later, my friend asked, "Yo why'd you change the last track? It was such a vibe."
I stared at him, confused. "You... wanted jazz, right?"
"Uh, no," he said, "I was asking the name of the track you'd played before. I loved it!"
And there it was, my people-pleasing tendency, tap-dancing in front of me. I knew my friend was a jazz aficionado. I knew jazz was about as appropriate for this minibus as Holi colors on Diwali night. The vibe had clearly been acid house, which is what I'd been playing before. But my friend was a DJ, and how dare I miss an opportunity to impress him with my eclectic taste that I was sure he'd appreciate because I just knew him so well, right?
I whispered to my partner, "I am such a people pleaser, dude." He chuckled, his grin screaming "No shit, Sherlock". He knows. He's known since our first date, when I probably tried to convince him I’m a cricket expert just because he worked for an OTT1 streaming platform.
When you grow up in the South Asian community, especially as an Indian, you're told to be the best of the best. And oh boy, did I lean into that like it was my job.
I collected titles like they were Pokemon cards: high ranker, teacher's pet, class monitor—you name it. I even became the staff room's cupboard monitor (whatever that is), because, apparently, I needed one more badge to feel….complete.
My parents were the proudest in the neighbourhood. "She's great, you have such a good kid," they'd hear, probably while I was at home ironing my gold stars and practising my humble acceptance speech for when I inevitably became the first teenage Nobel laureate.
When I was grinding for IIT-JEE, that exam every Indian kid's expected to crack, because brown parents just can’t see their kids breathing or prioritising mental health, my aunt swooped in with her sweet smile. Her offer? Crack the test, get a gold chain. It was a well-intentioned gesture, but it echoed a familiar pattern in our community. We're always dangled some prize. Achieve X, receive Y. It's the brown kid's hamster wheel.
There I was, sixteen and stressed, presented with another golden handcuff. Because the pressure of deciding your entire future when you can't even legally drive wasn't enough. We needed to add some bling to the breakdown.
I never got the gold chain. The absence of that chain felt like dead weight around my neck, a constant reminder of my failure. Seeing the disappointment in my family’s eyes was a gutting experience that left me feeling hollow for weeks.
That's the flip side of the people-pleasing high: when you can't deliver, the crash is devastating. And in that devastation, my lifelong people-pleasing tendencies intensified. The need to make others happy, to earn their approval—it wasn't new, but now it felt like a matter of survival.
Of DISCO / Nightclub
My college years were basically a masterclass in people-pleasing disguised as edgy rebellion, culminating in the formation of what I desperately needed everyone to believe was The Most Iconic Girl Gang Ever™. Everyone hated us like MLM recruits at a family reunion.
My people-pleasing morphed from straight A's to faux-rebellion chic.
I faced the infamous DISCO (DISciplinary COmmittee) for refusing to snitch on my batchmate for causing trouble, while simultaneously getting busted for having a phone in class. It was 2010, and phones were treated like weapons in our lecture halls. I kept my mouth shut because my lab partner was the culprit, and I refused to be that semester's most famous sellout. This had me losing out on a full semester of physics lectures and compromising my principles more than a politician during election season, all in pursuit of that elusive ‘cool’ status.
This desperate need for approval only metastasized during Post Grad, where making friends as an adult felt like a high-stakes poker game. Having curated my image as the ringleader of the 'cool gang' in undergrad, I couldn't bear losing the approval of my chosen audience – even if it meant alienating everyone else.
So naturally, my roommate and I agreed to transform our glorified closet of a hostel room – a 10x12 shoebox with beds that looked like they'd survived battles – into what we convinced ourselves was the hottest social club on campus. People made our room a regular hangout area. Soon I lost my sleep and finally in the last semester decided to sleep in a friend’s room.
From transforming our room into a questionable nightclub to constantly seeking validation for my ideas, my need for approval dictated my every move.
I'd conjure up a brilliant idea, then immediately turn to others with a "So, what do you think?"
It was all about that validating nod, quenching my insatiable thirst for approval. I slowly lost touch with my true self, my own voice drowned out by the chorus of others' expectations.
There were moments I saw myself nodding like a bobblehead, agreeing to help everyone while my sanity screamed for mercy.
When you're deep in the people-pleasing trenches, every damn thing you do is coated in a thick layer of "please love me" desperation. You view the world with a pair of glasses smeared with "what will they think?"
Sometimes it also looked like serving a cheese platter to a lactose intolerant friend - dishing out what you think others want, without considering if it's actually good for them (or you).
My whole life I’ve been a fraud
I've always known I’m a people pleaser. It's a dubious gift, really—this relentless self-awareness that often masquerades as self-criticism. Most steps of this exhausting dance, I've been painfully aware of — like an actor on a never-ending stage, constantly switching masks, always performing, yet never quite sure if the audience is truly pleased or just politely clapping.
In quiet moments, I bemoaned the loss of Ishita that could have been. The real me, buried under layers of people-pleasing and fear. What would she have said? Done? Become?
For years, I'd been running from myself like it's a zombie apocalypse, but the only thing chasing me was my own reality.
This people-pleasing addiction, it's like emotional crack, isn't it? I got high on impressing my partner, parents and friends, aced a few life tests, and raged on social media, because let's face it, that dopamine hit from a stranger's approval is one hell of a cheap thrill.
My friends praise my knack for curation, oblivious to the fact that I'd been sculpting and editing myself since day one. It's not art - it's survival.
Stop running from who you are. Where will you run?
It felt like my life had become an endless audition for a part I never truly wanted.
I spotted these patterns early, but breaking free was like trying to escape quicksand.
I'd developed an almost painful awareness of when my efforts to impress fell short. What hurt even more was realizing how crushed I felt when others didn't reciprocate my excessive efforts. Hailey Paige Magee’s words hit hard: “When others don’t hold up their end of the bargain, we become resentful. The thing is, they never signed up for this transaction in the first place.”
As the years passed, bringing with them the quiet wisdom of experience, I started to hear myself more clearly. The constant chatter of what everyone else wanted began to fade. I started having more conversations with my real self.
The post-grad room incident was just one of many wake-up calls. Finding myself deeply uncomfortable in a situation I thought I'd wanted jolted me into reality. These moments accumulated, each one a crack in the facade I'd built. Eventually, I couldn't ignore the reflection staring back at me, asking, "who are you when you stop performing and start being?"
Entering The Chrysalis
Gradually, I peeled the layers, interrogating my motives and finally giving voice to that whisper inside. I was in chrysalis.2
I’d promised myself a life of gentle unfolding— of finding and becoming more myself. My mantra became, "If it's not a hell yes, it's a no." If it didn't come from within, there was no chance I'd do it.
After years of practicing and living my truth, I could finally feel myself reconnecting with my core.
In 2020, as the world turned upside down and my head with it, I followed my heart to reclaim my sanity. I quit the big city life and moved to a small tropical town, seeking a slower, more conscious, and inward-focused existence. This idea of breaking free had been brewing in my mind for a while.
I'd finally realized I was never cut out for the fast-paced, social media-centric, capitalistic metropolises. My South Asian upbringing, the relentless pursuit of fame, money, and status were all staring at me in the face. But I was determined to finally give myself permission to define success on my own terms.
Getting away from the grind and the wired big city life was a godsend. I no longer had to pander to anyone—anyone—and that in itself was such a relief. I was changing, and fast. And seeing myself blooming out of chrysalis was truly adorable.
As I look back, I realise that being conscious of my tendencies has helped bring other aspects of my personality to the fore as well. It's slowed down my thinking, allowing me to question my language, thoughts, and behaviours more critically. I am better at interoception and honor my body’s wisdom every single moment. I have so much love and empathy for my past self, which in turn makes me hopeful for the ‘future me’. The ‘present me’ is comfortable spilling my guts on the internet for now.
I'm still rediscovering parts of myself, which is equally exhilarating and challenging. It requires consciously replacing parts of myself that no longer serve me. Sometimes, it feels urgent— if I don’t do it now, I am about to go down— sinking, suffocating in the cesspool of people pleasing, self awareness and self loathing.
But age has taught me to be patient with myself, for “the privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.”3
Until Next Sunday,
Ishita
x
Many thanks to
, , , , , , and Jose Gutierrez for their valuable feedback on this essay. <3Loving my Write of Passage journey! Special thanks to , her teachings about personal essays changed the way I wrote this piece.
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OTT stands for “over-the-top” and refers to technology (OTT services or platforms) that delivers streamed content via internet-connected devices.
In between being a caterpillar and becoming a butterfly, there is the chrysalis. This is the stage of old things giving way, the stage of goopy mess, of being neither caterpillar nor butterfly.
By Carl Jung
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Such an honest and well-told tale of people pleasing. "Because, apparently, the pressure of deciding your entire future when you can't even legally drive wasn't enough. We needed to add some bling to the breakdown." And I agree with Zail on being able to relate. Much of this feels very close to home.
Some wonderful writing and introspection here. Love it.