At any given time in a day, there are many people who are demanding some part of my time. With having clients in the salon, or children at home……just to name those out of many, I cannot seem to find the time to please each and every person that “needs” a part of me. I am a mom, hairstylist, daughter, friend….sister, psychologist….travel agent, event planner, homeschooling mom, maid, teacher, nurse, chef, uber driving crazy mom!! And that is not all! I try to fit everyone into my schedule and most days, I get it right. Most days, the majority of the people who have demanded my time are happy. All in all those are good days, but I think that I had forgotten something……If they are ever UNHAPPY, it is not my problem!! This is, of course, excluding my clients, their happiness is of the utmost importance to me and my businesses.

Time management is not a huge problem for me until I start saying “yes” to everyone who comes to me with a question. That is my biggest problem. I am a problem solver and I love to see people happy so whatever I can do to see it happen, I’m there! And yes, I do complain about it as I do it, sometimes, anyway.

We all want what we want, and we usually want it an hour before we even ask. Something that I am learning is that I cannot be everything to everyone. In the past, when I could not help someone to THEIR satisfaction, I felt responsible for whatever they were feeling. Whether they got angry, upset, disappointed….you name it, I felt bad because I chose to help to a certain capacity or not at all. I have learned that I can say no honestly and feel okay with saying it without an explanation. I mean really, when I did things that I didn’t really want to do, I am sure that my body language and my face told them the real story. I wear my heart on my sleeve so I know they could tell what I was feeling but most of them were just selfish enough to be happy because they were getting what they wanted. When we say yes and we really wanted to say no, we are lying  and crossing our own boundaries.

We are not responsible for the way that someone else feels. When one person feels that they are responsible for another’s feelings, they are unable to be free from the other person….then, you really aren’t able to love them either. You may feel resentful or annoyed that they even asked. I read this somewhere….”Guilty compliance is never love; it is slavery.” That is powerful! A truer statement than that cannot be told when it comes to a “people pleaser”.

Allowing someone to cross boundaries that you have is hard enough to deal with but what happens when it is you doing the crossing? I mean, sometimes our sense of responsibility is so warped and we begin to believe that we really have control over another’s feelings! Not only that, we try to make others responsible for ours…..wrong!!

We have to take a good look at ourselves and become aware of our behavior when we are interacting with others. Are we being self-centered and trying to control our family and friends, coworkers or others with our anger and disappointment when we are not getting our way? What about others…are they doing that to you? People who attempt to control others with their anger, sadness, or depression are just immature. This is the way a two-year old behaves and we didn’t accept it from them so we should not accept it from an adult.