One of my favourite works of fiction by an older Nigerian woman writer definitely is Joys of Motherhood by the late Nigerian writer and playwright, Buchi Emecheta.
It is a novel that explores the life of Nnu Ego, who makes several sacrifices for her children and defines her identity by her ability to birth sons and cope in a marriage where she is neither respected nor cared for.
Without giving too many spoilers, one of the major lessons I got from Joys of Motherhood is that women must actively unlearn the desire to please everyone. Even more, women must understand that as painful as it is, our freedom and ability to access the good things of life may mean us being disliked for not being doormats.
When reading the book, one gets the sense that most if not all of Nnu Ego’s misfortune came about because she not only felt a sense of duty towards people who did not appreciate her, but also came about because she could not put her foot down, displease people and stand her ground.
The sad thing was that she was so used to being a people pleaser, that the few times she did speak up for herself caused incredible rifts such that she had to go back to the old method of allowing other people’s desires to trample against hers.
Nnu Ego’s story may have been set in pre-independence Nigeria. However, the theme of people pleasing and not knowing how to say no is one that lots of women struggle with in and out of relationships.
Women are raised to be “nice”, “sweet” and agreeable to the point that we do not comprehend that more often than not a “nice” woman is one whose very essence has been scooped away and who must sacrifice her truest desires in order to keep a man. The end result is that she becomes full of resentment and bitterness.
Outside relationships, being a people pleasing woman can see such a woman not know how to adequately demand payment from her clients if she is a freelancer. This then leads to her experiencing financial difficulties because she finds it hard to charge adequately and chase those payments.
She becomes a woman whose friends expect her to do business related things for them freely and never think to offer to compensate her for the work done. They may even complain to her hearing that the job was not well done and that they want her to redo it.
In all this, her tongue will be tied because she does not know how to stand up for herself and most importantly say no, create boundaries and mean no.
Speaking with Rita, she explains that removing being a people pleaser has helped her stop doing free work where her friends are concerned.
In her words: “I’m a first born and first daughter to my mother(my dad had his first but that’s a story for another day) but I was the first in my home. Somehow I ended up as the perfect kid. I’m not now but I was a chronic people pleaser. I didn’t know this but I never had genuine relationships with people because I never got angry, never said my mind, never called people out, never laid boundaries. I was everybody’s friend. People thought I was nice, especially friends but they never took me seriously. And it began to eat at me. Resentment was building and I didn’t even know.
Now I’ll divert a bit. My mum is the worst people pleaser ever. I grew up thinking she was the nicest person in the world despite raising me harshly as an Ada. I understood her. As an empath I understood everyone. But I was the only one she managed to not care if she pleased or not. (N.B: I have a very good relationship with my mum. It’s just complex like all other human relationships).”
Rita went on to say: “But I didn’t realize I was the punching bag of other people’s punching bag until one day. My mum was going to tell me and my kid sister to do chores. Now this kid sis is the last born and yet my mum lowered her voice and said please. While she turned to me and ordered me in the most condescending tone ever. And that was when it clicked.
You see, I’ve tried not to be like my mum because I’ve seen her suffer for her kindness. If anything she’s the reason I started toughening up. Of course I have scenarios with friends and boyfriends but they aren’t worth mentioning but I didn’t realize I needed to change who I was from my core, from the home. After all, charity they say begins at home. And so my mum lost her perfect child. It didn’t happen once but that child is no more. Whatever consideration I allow is from love. Not for peace to reign or any of that bullshit and I’m happier because of it.
When I first started to sew, I was scared to bill my friends. I was literally sewing freely for them. But I realized that I was not nice, just foolish. When they have money they will rather pay someone else and not me; people I even sew better than. So I stopped the free clothes and stopped collecting peanuts because of friendship.
I still avoid confrontations if I can but I’m now the bad friend. They can no longer ride me like they used to and so our friendships are a bit rocky. But I’m fine. I’m still learning to speak my mind but I’ve come a long way. People are also starting to pay my worth in sewing and my friendship with some people has improved. So I’m glad.”
For Juliet, unlearning people pleasing is also tied to unlearning likability.
To quote her: “About this…I just saw a talk with CNA talking about not pursuing likeability and honestly I think one of the things I learnt very early in life is to be unlikeable. This is even if it came with a lot of messy childhood but I’m glad how it turned out.
One of the beauties of not people pleasing is how you can simply be yourself without palpitations and anxieties. Like, I could wake up one morning and decide on how to lead my life without worrying how people will perceive me, dayum I love that for me!”.
Juliet went on to say: “I generally feel relieved and like myself when I meet a person for the first time and they don’t like me. I get worried and anxious when a person meets me and they start talking about how they like me and enjoy spending time with me, it just makes me feel like I’m doing something wrong 😂
Unlearning people-pleasing has also helped me turn off people who aren’t serving my life any good. I don’t exert unnecessary energy on people who have made it their life purpose to disrespect me. I simply turn off and remove them from my life.
One cannot really be happy or be their true self if they are still letting other people be the central character of their lives.”
In order to fully thrive, women must learn to abandon people pleasing and a desire to be liked.
Being liked by everyone hardly offers full protection contrary to popular opinion.
What it does is make you a doormat whose needs are disrespected.
More women should aim to be respected and not necessarily liked. Only then can we make progress in how we set boundaries.
Angel Nduka-Nwosu is a writer, journalist and editor. She moonlights occasionally as a podcaster on As Angel Was Sayin’. Catch her on all socials @asangelwassayin.
