Watch the video above, then use the transcript and related reading below to explore the idea in more depth.
Video Transcript
Why you need everyone else to be okay before you can relax. If someone around you is angry, disappointed, stressed, or even a little bit off, can you relax? Or does something in you come online? You start watching their face, listening to their tone, wondering what happened, whether you've caused it, whether you should ask, help, explain, fix it, anything to get things back to okay.
And until they're okay, you're not really okay at all. We usually call this Is It Caring — Or Something Else? caring, sensitive, empathetic, or people pleasing. But what if sometimes it's something else? What if you learn to Regulating Yourself Through Other People regulate yourself by regulating everyone around you?
Because there's a massive difference between I care that you're upset and I need you to stop being upset so I can feel okay again. From the outside, those can look almost identical. In both cases, you might help, listen, make a tea, lighten the mood, explain yourself, apologize, or try to solve the problem. But underneath, something completely different might be happening.
In one, it might be, I see that you're struggling and I care about you. In the other, your state changed, my state changed with it, and now I need us both to get back to Where This Pattern Can Begin okay. And I think this can start much earlier than we realize. Imagine learning that other people's moods matter.
Dad comes home angry. Mom goes quiet. Someone starts slamming cupboards. A teacher's tone changes.
Someone gives you that look. Nobody has actually said anything to you yet, but you already know something has changed. So, you start paying attention. Are they annoyed?
Did I do something? Should I be quiet? Should I help? Should I disappear?
Should I make them laugh? Their State Tells Me What to Do Your system learns their state tells me what I need to do next. That can be incredibly useful. But do it for long enough and you stop noticing other people's moods.
You start organizing yourself around them. Someone is relaxed, you relax. Someone is angry, you brace. Someone is disappointed, you explain.
Someone goes quiet, you scan. Someone is stressed, you help. Someone withdraws and you wonder what you did. Being Good at Reading People And eventually, you may think, "I'm really good at reading people." And you probably are.
But here's the question. What happens inside of you when you read something that you don't like? Because noticing someone's mood is one thing. What Happens When You Set a Boundary?
Feeling responsible for changing it is another. Imagine you set a perfectly reasonable boundary. No, I can't do that today. And the other person is disappointed.
Technically, nothing has gone wrong. You made a decision and they had a reaction. Two people are allowed to have two different experiences. But can you tolerate that?
Or do you immediately explain, soften the no, offer something else, feel guilty, or start questioning whether your boundary was reasonable? And if they stay disappointed long enough, do you eventually change your decision? Because maybe the problem wasn't that you didn't Changing Yourself to Change Them know your boundary. Maybe their reaction became too uncomfortable for you to tolerate.
So you changed yourself to change them. And when they became okay again, you relaxed. Now look at what your system just learned. If they are The Emotional Regulation Loop upset, I feel bad.
If I fix it, I feel better. That creates a loop. They become uncomfortable. You become uncomfortable.
You do something to restore things. They settle. You settle. And your system learns.
Do that again next time. They can look like a wonderfully caring person, which is why it can be so bloody difficult to spot. Maybe you're always When Someone's Mood Takes Over Your Attention smoothing things over. Maybe you can't enjoy yourself when someone you love is struggling.
Maybe one short message saying fine can change your entire evening. You read it again. Was that angry? What did I do?
Should I call? Should I send another message? Maybe I should explain what I meant and notice what just happened. Their state became the most important information in your environment.
Your attention left you and went straight to them. So underneath, are they okay? There may be a much more interesting question. Am I okay if they're not?
Can somebody be disappointed with you and you remain connected to yourself? Can somebody misunderstand you without you spending hours trying to correct their version of you? Can somebody be angry without you assuming automatically that you need to do something? Can somebody be sad without you feeling responsible for removing their sadness?
Can somebody say, "I don't like that." And you still know I like that. Because this is where caring and self-abandonment get tangled. Caring vs Self-Abandonment Caring says, "I can see that you're uncomfortable." The old pattern says, "Therefore, I must change." Caring allows another person to have an experience. The old pattern makes their experience feel like something you have to manage.
And sometimes you manage it by changing yourself. You become quieter, nicer, more agreeable, more useful, less demanding. You stop talking about what you wanted. You hide what you actually think.
You wait for a better time. And sometimes there genuinely is a better time. But if you repeatedly disappear every time someone else Connection Feels Safest When You Adjust becomes uncomfortable, your system may have learned connection is safest when I adjust first. So, here's where we can How to Test the Pattern actually test this.
The next time somebody is disappointed, don't immediately explain. If somebody goes quiet, notice the urge to ask what's wrong. If somebody disagrees with you, notice the urge to prove your position and watch what happens inside you. Because the hardest part might not be their reaction.
It may be what happens in you when you stop managing their reaction. Maybe guilt appears. Maybe your body gets tense. Maybe the thoughts start.
Was I selfish? Maybe I should check. Maybe I was too harsh. I could just do it.
It's not that big a deal. Make Them Okay So We Can Be Okay There it is. Make them okay so we can be okay. And now you can see the pattern instead of simply obeying it.
The goal isn't to stop caring about people. You can care deeply. You can help. You can comfort someone.
You can apologize when you've actually done something wrong. You can even change your mind. But now those things can become choices. Rather than automatic attempts to make your own Do I Want to Help — Or Need to Help? discomfort disappear.
So instead of asking how do I make them feel better, try asking do I want to help them or do I need to help them so I can stop feeling this. That question can expose a lot. And imagine what your system is learning when somebody is disappointed with you and you don't immediately abandon yourself. You listen.
You check whether you've actually done something wrong. If you have, repair it. If you haven't, you let them have their reaction and eventually your system starts collecting different evidence. Teaching Your System Something New Someone can be unhappy with me and I can still be okay.
Someone can misunderstand me and I don't have to chase them. Someone can be disappointed and I don't have to change my no. Someone can have a bad mood without it becoming my job. So, What Does Their Mood Require You to Do? next time someone is around you that's upset, annoyed, stressed, disappointed, quiet, slightly off, don't immediately ask, "How do I make them okay?" Notice yourself first.
Where did your attention go? What did your body do? And most importantly, what do I think their mood requires me to do? fix, explain, apologize, disappear, help, agree, give in. That answer may show you what has The Exhaustion of Emotional Monitoring been running underneath the behavior because maybe you're not exhausted from caring too much.
Maybe you're exhausted from constantly monitoring the emotional weather around you and changing yourself every time the weather changes. And maybe the next step isn't caring less. The Real Next Step Maybe it's discovering that somebody else cannot be okay without you leaving yourself to make them okay.
Related Reading
- The Sovereign Self-Organising System: How Protection, Awareness, and Self-Trust Actually Work
- Personality or Coping Mechanism? How Much of It Is Actually You?
- The Day I Let Someone Be Disappointed
- You’re Not Stuck, You’re Repeating What Once Worked
Read the original article: Why You Need Everyone Else to Be Okay Before You Can Relax
