Stop Being the Solution

Are you sick and tired of being the one?

You know: the go-to, the gopher, the middleman, the moderator, or the mediator.

Have you been so good at not being the problem that everyone else has learned to think of you as the solution?

That's the result of some conditioning from your past, but fret not. For you're not alone and there is a simple formula to follow to regain your boundaries, remove your shackles, and stop performing unpaid labor for undeserving friends, family, and sometimes strangers.

Now, don't get me wrong. The occasional good deed from a good Samaritan like yourself can go a long way.

I'm not saying, "Never hold the door open for a stranger again," but there's got to be a line. If you've ever held the door open for such a big crowd that you lost the friends who walked in ahead of you, then you're in the right place.

Step One: Choose You

Each and every day you wake up, you're alone inside your head. As the alarm jerks you from the reality of your dreams back to the reality where the rest of us also exist, you get to begin again. A reset button we press before each slumber leads us to another chance to define ourselves.

This is your first chance each day to prioritize yourself—setting your mindset, goals for the day, and generally just establishing the expectation that your aim is to live your life and take care of yourself.

Since we've already established that you do for others beyond what you do for yourself, then I can say with confidence that you define yourself similarly to how everyone else does but likely in a more pragmatic way. You think of yourself fondly as a people pleaser, a term you may consider endearing.

Who wouldn't want to be known as pleasing?

You. Starting now. Some people think of a people pleaser in other terms: pushover, martyr, chump—to name a few.

This people pleasing comes at a cost to you. Sometimes, it is great. Other times, it may feel entirely insignificant. You don't bother to balance your needs with the needs of others because you enjoy the ease of making someone else's life better and the appreciation (though likely dwindling) shown to you by them.

The balancing act you choose not to perform has led to your side of the teeter-totter sitting in the dirt while you hold everyone else soaring through the air. Your butt has gone numb, your knees are sore, and you're too old to sit like that.

So, what do you do?

Choose you. Sometimes, when the cost to yourself is greater than the return (which I know it often is, and you do too), don't help. Don't stick your neck out there for someone who's got their turtleneck on and has everything to gain from your kindness with nothing to lose, yet again.

Choose you. When someone wants you to cancel plans to aid them, remember the last time they did that for you. Oh yeah, that's never happened, has it?

Choose you. Know the difference between your free time and your available time. When you have no reason to draw a boundary other than needing to take care of yourself, recognize that obligation to you is at least as important as the supposed obligation to someone else.

Step Two: Find Your Boundaries

Right now, you're used to giving in, oftentimes without much defense whatsoever. You've taught yourself that prioritizing other people and avoiding conflict are defining characteristics of your identity and your principles. I'm not saying to shift from Santa Claus to Ebenezer Scrooge overnight, but somewhere between them is a sweet spot where a much mentally healthier version of you awaits.

Look at Santa from a practical standpoint (seriously). He's one man who loves everyone. He loves them so much that one night a year he races across the globe, delivering gifts to all the nice boys and girls. Just to survive that night, he needs a thick diet of dairy and sugar to keep the energy up, negatively affecting his physical well-being. In fact, that one night a year is so taxing that he needs to take the next three-hundred-sixty-four days off altogether.

On the other hand, Scrooge lives in a mansion. He was living it up and running a business in his late fifties during a time where the average life expectancy of a man capped around thirty-eight years old. Of course, he was a friendless old curmudgeon who nobody wanted to be around—a fate worse than death to many of us.

You don't really want to be either of them. Santa, self-sacrificing and exhausted, or grumpy, old Ebenezer with everything he thought he wanted but no love in his heart.

You need to find that balance where you can take care of yourself and still be good to others. Maybe it's no longer lending money to that relative that has never paid you back. Maybe it's not missing your favorite band coming to town for the first time in twenty years because your friend needs help moving and couldn't pick a different day. Maybe it's telling your boss that darning his socks isn't in your job description.

Whatever it is, only you can find it, and only you can enforce it. Find the boundaries you can no longer cross or let others cross and thrive within them.

I hear you asking, "But how?"

Step Three: Say No

Maybe you prefer to avoid the conflict or 'guilt' you feel from the dreaded word NO. You likely grew up hearing it a lot. You were often denied things you wanted in favor of someone else, like a parent, a sibling, or just "because I said so."

You hated it. You wished no one ever said No to you. So, now how could you darken someone's day with those two gloomy letters? By abbreviating.

How many times has this happened to you?

You- "No, because XYZ."

Them- "Well, XYZ isn't really that important." or "You'll get another chance for XYZ." or maybe even "Who cares about XYZ? I need ABC."

Well, you care about XYZ, of course. That's why you said it and why you're still here. At some point along the way to this point, you learned something false. You learned that No is meant to be followed by a comma. Well, sometimes it isn't. Sometimes, No is best followed by a period.

To many, everything that comes after the comma is just an objection to overcome. It is merely a passable obstacle between them and you making them happy. They'll often only hear, "I have a bad excuse not to help you."

No sounds different. When said alone, it sounds more like a fact. Sure, some people are going to ask for more information but changing your mindset to inherently trust your No to mean No will make any 'excuse' you add much more resolute.

Step Four: Ask Unabashedly

You don't want to bother someone else with the needs of someone as seemingly unimportant as yourself. So, you become independent or live without. Along with not saying no, you've also begun to assume everyone else always will or maybe even should say No to you.

That's not fair. It's not fair to you or anyone else. I know I've spoken negatively about people consistently up to this point, but some of them are only naive to your plight, not willfully ignorant. They don't know that you have needs because you've never expressed them, avoiding ever asking for help because you're an inconvenience in your own eye—or you're too proud, but that's another story. Either way, knock it off.

Your suffering in silence does nothing for anyone, especially yourself. By neglecting yourself by presumably sparing someone the dreadful inconvenience of helping you, you're doing both people a disservice. You're denying yourself the help you need, perpetuating the idea that your own plight is helpless, and you're denying someone who likely does care about you the chance to feel valued and helpful.

By not asking, you've not taken away just the minor inconvenience of asking, but you've also taken away their agency. You took away their right to decide whether they can or will help you. You have removed their agency to say yes or No.

If I know you like I think I do (which I do because I had to find my way here too), then I also know that you're thinking about how crazy I must be for suggesting that not bothering someone is bad for them. Knock that off, too. I am crazy, but that has nothing to do with it.

I'll guarantee there is someone in your life that would love the opportunity to return a favor you'd previously never bring up. There's some kind soul who knows they owe you one has no idea how to pay you back. There's someone out there that, like you, feels guilty for having accepted help. That person would do anything to get out from under that self-imposed prison of guilt. Give them that chance.

You'll learn that the more you let others aid you, the more you'll build meaningful relationships. Like with boundaries, you're looking for your happy medium. Don't become the needy neighbor that stops buying sugar because next door will always spare a cup or the guy on a smoke break who quit but will still bum one at every chance. The only thing he quit is buying them.

Step Five: Thrive

Now that you're choosing yourself, establishing boundaries, saying No, and asking unabashedly, what's left? Whatever you want. That's the point, right?

You'll no longer be living solely for other people. You'll still likely find fulfillment in helping others. Perhaps even more, because now you'll be choosing people who really need help. They'll be the ones that need your help. More than likely, they'll be the ones that you believe actually appreciate it.

This choosiness in who, when, and how you help isn't selfishness, it's righteousness. Righteousness to yourself and those truly in need and deserving of your time and energy. When you've limited all the spending of those things to be within your realistic boundaries, you'll find you have more time and peace of mind. Sure, you'll likely lose some people who seemed like friends along the way, but losing people that expect you to prioritize them over yourself isn't actually a loss.

It's a tremendous gain. Having granted yourself the same grace you once offered everyone else at the expense of your self, you will find there's so much more to life than being on call for everyone else's problems.

Use it wisely, this life returned to you—reclaimed by you. Or don't. It's yours after all, finally.

Step Six: Like, Subscribe, Share

Ha ha. This step is really just a revisit to Step Four: Ask Unabashedly. It's just my turn to do it. It's just a quick request to support your Vocal Madman. It's only a few clicks to add a little heart to the article, make sure I show up in your feed, and send this to whoever else could use a little lesson in how to take care of themselves without giving up their love for others.

You can have both, I promise.

You can find me on Facebook at Tales from a Madman, where I promote my writing and hope to talk to you about literature, madness, and more, or at Third Eye Fourth Dimension, where we discuss the mystical, the magical, and beyond.

Good Fortune to You.

-Your Madman