By the time one of my clients drove into work, she often felt behind. She ran a business and cared about the people who worked for her. Messages could reach her throughout the day, and she was used to answering within seconds. She wanted her team to know she was there for them.
Then an employee gave her feedback. My client felt defensive. She calmed herself and thanked the employee, but later, as she told me about it, she noticed how quickly she had put her own reaction away. She wanted to be respectful and kind. She was also angry.
When we stayed with that anger, she began to hear what hurt beneath it. She worked hard to take care of her employees. When someone wanted more from her, she felt that her effort hadn’t been seen. She worried that she had let them down.
I asked her where she felt that. There was a slight heaviness in her chest. Her breathing became constricted. Beneath the anger was an ache of not feeling valued.
She recognized that doing more for people was one of the ways she had learned to earn love. She cared about her employees, and their disappointment could still leave her feeling that she wasn’t enough for them. No answer to their feedback could, by itself, settle that feeling.
As the ache eased, she could look at the employee’s request again. She could listen and decide what was fair. She began to see that a boundary might simply mean remaining with her decision, even if someone wished she had chosen differently. She didn’t have to push down her anger or let it make the decision for her.
Then she thought about her phone. She wanted to become comfortable replying in a couple of hours instead of a couple of seconds. She knew it was possible: during our sessions, messages waited while she gave her attention to what was in front of her. An ordinary workday was harder. Waiting to reply brought up the old feeling that she wasn’t doing enough.
That is one place to begin if you feel responsible for everyone else’s feelings. Notice the moment you hurry to answer, agree, explain, or make things right. What happens in your body if you imagine letting the other person be disappointed for a little while? What do you fear their disappointment would mean about you?
You can care about what they feel. You can take responsibility for what you do. And you can give yourself time to find out what you want to offer before trying to make the uncomfortable feeling go away.