Why Do I Feel Responsible For Everyone's Feelings?

Do you often feel responsible for other people's happiness, moods or reactions? Do you find yourself trying to keep everyone happy, even at the expense of your own wellbeing?In this talk, we explore why we can develop an exaggerated sense of responsibility for how others feel, how this pattern may have begun, and what helps us loosen its grip. Discover how to care deeply about others without taking responsibility for their emotional lives — and give yourself permission to put down a burden that was never entirely yours to carry.

Transcript

Hello my friend, I'm Alison and in this talk I'm going to answer the question that you might be asking yourself. Why do I feel responsible for how everyone else feels? Why do we take on the burden of other people's stress, For example, And feel it in our own bodies? Do you ever find yourself kind of monitoring for how everybody else is feeling? Perhaps someone's quiet and immediately you're wondering what's wrong or even what you have done wrong. Or someone seems disappointed and you immediately think it's your job to make them feel better and you start thinking about what can I do to make them feel better? Perhaps someone is upset with you or seems to be upset with you and you find it almost irresistible, Really have a compelling need to explain, Reassure, Fix, Smooth things over, Make sure they're okay, Over-apologize, Apologize even when you don't know what you've done. Perhaps you haven't done anything at all. It might be that you're very sensitive to changes in tone of voice, Someone's facial expression, A message you receive that's shorter than the messages you normally receive from a person, A sense of someone withdrawing or being distant. Now, Obviously we care and it's difficult when we are aware of people around us exhibiting these behaviours, But for some of us, It can become a feeling that their feeling has become your problem to solve. So that's why we ask the question, Why do some of us feel so responsible for how everybody else feels? And perhaps an even more important question, How do we stop carrying responsibility that was never really ours? Caring and responsibility are not the same thing. You can care and not carry and not make yourself the problem or the problem solver. Let's start here because I don't want the answer to be stop caring. If you're an empathic person, You probably do notice other people's feelings. You might be naturally attentive to people. You might care deeply about their well-being. And you may be really good at sensing when something isn't quite right. And these are beautiful human qualities. But somewhere along the way, Noticing someone's feelings can become feeling responsible for them. And there's a big difference between those two things. There's a big difference between, I can see you're upset and I care, I care about that. And you're upset, Therefore I need to do something to make you not upset. One is empathy and the other is responsibility. And we can become so accustomed to moving from one to the other that we don't even notice that we're doing it in the moment. So you may be wondering where this comes from. For some people, A lot of people, It actually begins very early. A lot of our behaviours that we can't really explain do begin very early. Psychologist and author Rick Hansen has spoken really openly about his own experience of this and he describes being an empathic and caring child with a mother who was struggling in some ways. And discovering that he could sometimes cheer her up. He could listen to her. He could be a confidant. And of course, For a child, That can feel really good. That feeling of, I can help. I can make things better. I have some power here. And children are extraordinarily adaptive. If paying close attention to the emotional atmosphere around you helps you feel connected, Secure, Useful, You may become really good at it. You learn to scan. How's mum? How's Dad? Is everybody okay? Is somebody angry? Do I need to be good? Funny? Helpful. Quiet. Easy. Successful. Can I make this better? And sometimes that happens in families where nobody's done anything deliberately wrong. Perhaps a parent was grieving, Or overwhelmed, Or anxious, Or lonely, Or under-supported. And perhaps there was conflict. And perhaps there simply wasn't much room for difficult emotion, Because there was so much else going on. And sometimes it happens because a child receives a lot of approval for being the helpful one, Or the mature one, Or the peacemaker, Or the one who never causes any trouble. That's a role they find themselves internalizing and continuing into adulthood. But what we learn is other people's well-being has something to do with me. And that's what can follow us into adult life. And what that leads to is an overestimating of our influence. We can overestimate our influence on others, Their moods, Their behavior. And this is where Rick Hansen makes a point I find enormously helpful. He says that people who've developed this pattern can acquire an excessive sense of their own influence, An unrealistic appraisal. Of how much influence they actually have over what is happening inside somebody else's mind. I think this is such an important insight, Because when we feel over-responsible for other people, We usually think we're being caring, And often we are. But hidden inside that caring can be the belief, I have the power to make this person okay. Or, If they're not okay, I must have failed somehow. It must be my fault. And neither of those things is actually true. Another person's inner world is being shaped by thousands of things. The History. Our nervous system. Their beliefs. Their expectations. What happened to them yesterday? What happened 20 years ago? Their relationships, Their health, Their disappointments. Their hopes, Their interpretation of what just happened. Things you know about and things you know absolutely nothing about. You are one influence in another person's extraordinarily complex life. You're not the whole weather system. And there's something wonderfully humbling about recognizing that because it means that you don't have as much power over somebody else's feelings as you thought you did, Which is actually really good news. Especially when someone is unhappy with us. Because it comes particularly difficult when other people's feelings are actually about us or they're made to feel about us. That's how our nervous system gets really ignited. It can really light up and we can feel very anxious. Many emotions can arise and we can have those sorts of thoughts. They must be disappointed in me. They're angry with me. They don't like what I've done. Misunderstood me. There can be feelings of shame, Of disconnection, Of feeling like we've been misunderstood. And suddenly we can feel compelled to get inside their mind and change what's happening there. Which means things like trying to explain more or apologize or apologize again, Send another message. Make ourselves smaller. Try and please, You know, Fawn. Change a boundary that actually is our boundary. Say yes when we actually mean no. And take responsibility for things that aren't ours. Sometimes we do need to apologise, Sometimes we have behaved. Unfortunately. Sometimes another person's hurt is useful information and we want to be able to hear that. But another person having a feeling about us doesn't automatically mean that we've done something wrong. And even when we have done something wrong, We can take responsibility for our behavior without taking responsibility for their entire emotional experience. I can be responsible to you without being responsible for you. And that's a distinction worth remembering. One of the things that can really help us is learning to tolerate the fact that somebody else might be uncomfortable. Discomfort isn't necessarily an emergency or a huge problem. That happens all of us. All humans have times when they're disappointed. We all misunderstand each other sometimes. We get irritated. We sometimes wish someone's made a different decision. And so the same is true when someone may be disappointed or have misunderstood ourselves, Or may feel irritated because of something we've said or done, And they may wish we'd made a different decision. But what happens in our body Because this can build and bring a huge sense of threat, That anxious feeling is fix it. But perhaps there's actually nothing that needs fixing. Maybe you could think about it as simply another human being having a human feeling. And they're allowed to. Human beings are allowed to have human feelings. They do. Feelings are allowed. We don't have to rush in and remove every difficult feeling from the people we love. And indeed we can't. Think about the people you love most in the world. You can't prevent them from experiencing disappointment, Sadness, Frustration, Insecurity, Grief or fear. You couldn't do it even if you devoted your entire life to trying. And sometimes our attempts to make sure nobody ever feels bad actually prevents us from having honest relationships. Because now we're not asking, What is true for me? We're asking, What do I need to do so that you don't have a difficult feeling? And these are very different questions. So here's something you can actually begin practicing around this, And that's noticing the moment you start to pick up the responsibility. Notice the moment you feel it, When you notice the familiar activation around somebody else's feelings. And then also the sense that there's something you need to do, That's a feeling of responsibility to change the situation. And instead of running ahead and doing that, See if you can pause in the discomfort you're feeling before doing anything and ask, What am I making myself responsible for here? Not how do I fix this. First, What have I decided is my job? Have I decided it's my job to stop them being disappointed? Or to make them understand me? Or to stop them being angry? To reassure them? Is it my job to make them approve of my decision? Or to make sure they don't think badly of me. And just notice. And see what the job is that you're making your job. Because sometimes when we do that, We see this invisible job that we've given ourselves. And when we see that and we're aware of it, I gave myself that invisible job. That is enough. To begin loosening it. It's the same if you feel you've received someone trying to put that responsibility on you in case you're wondering. It's, Am I going to take that responsibility just because someone wants me to? We take that pause and we say, Is this realistic? Is this really my responsibility? We can ask, What actually does belong to me here? Perhaps something does. Maybe you need to apologise. Maybe you need to listen. There might be something you can repair. There might be something you can communicate more clearly, And you can do that. But then. . . Notice also what belongs to them. Because they'll have their interpretation, They'll have their own expectations, They've got their own history and way of seeing things. And also they have their own feelings and their own choices. And they can choose how they respond and their response is theirs. They have their own process. Those aren't ours. Those aren't yours. And you can care about all of those things and notice them and allow them and respect them without taking any ownership. So in a way the message is let people have their feelings. They're allowed to feel how they feel. Even about you. It doesn't mean their interpretation is correct. It doesn't mean you have to agree with them. And it doesn't mean you don't care. But it does mean that you're allowing another adult to have an inner world that you don't have any control over. And that means you can have yours. And that's actually a respectful way to relate to someone. It's saying, I don't need to manage your mind, And you don't need to manage mine. We can meet each other here. And notice what happens when you don't fix. This is where the practice becomes really embodied because you'll get feedback. So perhaps someone is unhappy and you don't immediately send the reassuring message. Perhaps you said no and you don't rush back in with three paragraphs explaining why or change your mind. Perhaps somebody seems a little off and you don't immediately ask yourself, What have I done wrong? Right? So don't do those things and feel what happens inside your body. There may be anxiety and urgency and guilt and that feeling that you're doing something wrong. And what I'm going to advise is you don't treat those feelings as instructions. You don't take advice from them. You stay with yourself. You treat them as exactly what they are, Which is an unsettled response inside of you, Which you are allowed to have. And it won't last forever. You could bring your hands to your body, Hold your arms, Place a hand on your heart, Feel your feet, Slow your breathing, Slowly look around the room you're in, The space. And by doing that, You're reminding your body someone else having a feeling is not an emergency. And that you can care but you don't have to do anything or take over or adapt yourself unnecessarily. Your body gets the message. This person can have their experience and I can have mine. And that message is really saying, What if I'm not as responsible for this as I think I am? And there's a really lovely, Beautiful side to this, Which is we're giving people back. Their own capability when we stop assuming responsibility for other people's emotional lives. Rather than abandoning them. Quite the opposite. We're actually respecting and remembering. That they have capability. This person has lived through things before. And they have resources. And they have choices. And they have a nervous system capable of moving through different states. So they can be disappointed and they'll survive it. They can be sad and they can get through that sadness, It's okay. They can even sometimes be angry with us and that's okay too. We don't need to regard the people we love as so fragile. Threatening that we have to continually manage their emotional experience. And showing people that you. . . Letting them have their own process develops some trust in them. We're saying we trust you to sort this out, You know, To be able to attend to yourself. And it means you can trust yourself more too. So your responsibility becomes smaller but much simpler and much more powerful because it's now simpler. Because all it's saying is, I'm responsible for how I behave and how I respond, For the kind of words I choose, For whether I act with kindness, Integrity. I'm responsible for hearing someone if they're telling me I have hurt them, And repairing what genuinely belongs to me. I'm also responsible for communicating my boundaries respectfully. For noticing when fear is taking over and running my behavior. That's taking care of my own nervous system. And that's enough. In fact, That's plenty. And what you're not responsible for is creating a life in which no one's ever disappointed or upset or uncomfortable or unhappy with you. We can work very hard to try and do that. But we hadn't got that power or that control. It's a waste of our efforts. It doesn't help us. Nobody can do that. There's almost nothing you can do to control what's happening inside another human being. And of course you can influence and you can love and you can listen and encourage, You can apologize, You can offer kindness, You can stand next to somebody, But ultimately their own inner world belongs to them. And yours belongs to you. So perhaps today, When you notice yourself reaching across that invisible boundary and trying to manage what someone else is feeling, You can come gently back. You can ask what does belong to me here and what does belong to them. Can I let them have their feelings and is there something kind or appropriate that I can do and let it be enough. And that's sometimes the hardest one, Can I let that be enough? Because we worry that means we're not caring anymore or that there is something we can change that actually we can't but we haven't tried enough, You know? But it doesn't mean that you've had to stop caring. You don't have to harden your heart. You can have your beautiful empathy and your kindness and your responsiveness and your desire to help, But you can put down that impossible, Invisible job of trying to make everybody okay. And you might discover that life and love feel really different when they're not carrying that job. That there's more space in it, More honesty, More trust, And more freedom for you, For them, For everyone. So people often ask me, Have you got a track for when we feel we're taking on too much of other people? And I do have some tracks. I'll put them in the description. Of this track if you want to go and find them and find out more. But until then, I hope that you have found something useful and helpful from this talk and until we meet again, Do take good care of yourself. Bye for now.

Reviews

I hadn’t thought or looked at it this way - really helpful. Thank you!