Compulsive Eating and People-Pleasing

To heal compulsive eating, stop people-pleasing.

People-pleasing and compulsive eating are linked, and to heal, we must look at tendencies to people-please.

There are multiple ways these compulsions can be linked:

We can overextend ourselves to the point that we don't have time to properly care for our nutrition, exercise, sleep and other vital health practices.

In people-pleasing, we are often seeking worth, praise, or other emotions that we do not feel otherwise. We may also be fulfilling a role that we feel we must fulfill. We could also be avoiding others' anger or disapproval if we put up boundaries or exert our real opinion.

Because we aren't working through people-pleasing properly as an issue in and of itself, our poor nutrition is collateral damage.

Let's work through the underlying reasons why we are inclined to people-pleasing, and this will automatically solve the part of your suboptimal eating behaviors that are related.

We can also overeat because we are internally building resentment about people-pleasing.

When we chronically people-please with our actions, overextending ourselves or even just by molding our opinions and expression to please others, we can build resentment over time.

In an effort to suppress our anger, rage, and resentment about people-pleasing, we can use food to swallow these emotions down.

We need to look at why we are still people-pleasing when we know it is not good for us.

We can also compulsively eat related to people-pleasing because we are afraid. Many people live in terror of others' disapproval and we numb with food to numb our anxiety.

In this we must face our fears of not people-pleasing, rather than living in and justifying fear and then having this affect our eating.

As a recovering people-pleaser myself, I can say that while it can be terrifying to stop people-pleasing, and while some people may drop out of your life if you're not willing to sacrifice for them in action or expression, it ultimately is such a happier place to live in.

Working through addictions to people-pleasing automatically assists addictions to food.

Photo by Katie Sue Photography