Being the Good Girl is a Mask. And You’ve Been Wearing it For Years

Last night, I was on a call with my embodied facilitator group. We were working with storytelling - not just telling someone what happened, but going back inside an experience: orienting to the space, noticing what was happening in your body, and letting yourself remember what it actually felt like to be there.

And this memory came back to me that I hadn't thought about in decades.

I was a little girl in the car with my family in Southern California.

I remember looking out the window at the mountains. There were sheep and shepherds on the hills, and on the other side, the ocean. The sun was coming through the window, and there was this pathway of light across the water, like thousands of tiny glistening diamonds. I just loved looking at it.

And then something would happen between my parents.

I heard it in my dad's voice.

The tone changed.

He was angry with my mom. She protested, he got angrier, and eventually I felt her recoil and withdrew.

I remember the atmosphere in the car changing. And my whole body responded.

My chest and stomach would contract. I'd become hyperalert.

Monitoring him. Monitoring her.

Trying to be attentive to my little brothers and sisters.

I would go to work.

Keep the kids quiet. Don't let anyone make Dad angrier. Try to calm things down. Help Mom. Sometimes referee between them. Try to restore some version of normal.

Try to make sure we could go back to possibly having a nice day instead of everything going to hell.

Looking back now, I can see how intelligent that response actually was.

I wasn't “people pleasing.” I was trying to protect us, Trying to make sure everything was okay and trying to get us out of active chaos.

At that age, connection, security, family, home - my entire world - really did depend upon these people.

So I became extraordinarily good at noticing what everyone else needed. What mood are you in? What should I say? What can't I say? How can I help? How do I keep this from getting worse? How do I make everything okay?

And that capacity followed me into adulthood. I can anticipate. Help. Accommodate. Take responsibility. Read a room. Feel other peoples emotional state almost immediately.

And I could know what everyone else needed before I had any idea what my needs were.

That's the part I've been thinking about.

Because something can begin as an incredibly intelligent adaptation and become so automatic that eventually you don't even experience it as something you're choosing.

It just feels like who you are. I'm helpful, I'm easygoing, I'm the strong one, I can handle it.

I don't mind.

Maybe.

But are you even aware of what is happening for you?

That's where this work gets interesting to me.

Not:

“Stop people pleasing and put yourself first.”

I don't think it's nearly that simple.

The deeper question is:

Can I remain in contact with myself while I'm in contact with you?

Can I feel what you need without automatically making it my responsibility?

Can you be disappointed without my entire system organizing around fixing it?

Can I help because I genuinely want to and have the energy and resources to -not because somewhere inside me connection still feels dependent upon it?

Can I know what I think, feel and want while someone I love is having a completely different experience?

Because if I organize myself around you in order to preserve our connection, something strange eventually happens:

You don't actually have access to me either.

You have access to the version of me designed to keep everything okay.

That's what I mean when I talk about the mask.

Not that it's fake because you're dishonest.

Not that there's anything shameful about it.

Quite the opposite.

The mask was intelligent.

It may have protected something enormously important once.

But eventually we need to be able to see it as a strategy rather than mistake it for ourselves.

And then the work becomes much more interesting:

What else is available now?

This is some of what we'll be exploring in Blossoming Lotus, the women's group I'm beginning next month.

Not how to become more selfish.

Not how to stop caring about other people.

But how to develop enough contact with yourself that caring about someone else doesn't require leaving yourself behind.

I'm opening this first cohort to a small group of women.

If this feels familiar and you'd like to know more, simply reply “Blossoming” and I'll send you the details.

Love and blessings, 

P.S. There's an important distinction here that I want to explore more deeply in this week's audio edition:

Why can we understand a pattern completely and still find ourselves doing it?

Knowing why you became this way is important.

But knowing isn't the same thing as having another response available when something important is actually at stake.

That's where development begins.

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