Stop Shrinking. Start Aligning. The Hidden Cost of Always Saying Yes

If saying no makes your palms sweat and your voice shake, you are not alone — and you are not weak. According to life coach Maneesha Ahluwalia, that reaction is not a character flaw. It is conditioning. Through her own deeply personal journey and years of working with women, Maneesha has uncovered what people-pleasing really costs us — not just emotionally, but physically — and what it actually takes to stop shrinking and start living on your own terms.

1. "Why do so many people struggle to say no — and what is it actually costing them?"
The moment I even think about saying no to somebody who is expecting a yes, I get the jitters, my palms get sweaty, my voice gets shaky. I start delaying and avoiding answering the question. It's so interesting that saying a two-letter word brings up so much activation in the body.

I had a client who is a physician, and every Sunday you would find her at her parents' place helping them with things, being there as their emotional support for various issues happening in their family. She would come home Sunday evening, exhausted, only to restart the week on Monday. She was finding herself more and more depleted by this cycle. She knew exactly what she would be doing if she wasn't visiting her family on the weekends. She would be swimming, she said. She liked that form of exercise. She enjoyed it. It was something that reminded her of her childhood.

She couldn't figure out what was holding her back. She realized it was her family's disappointment in her that was becoming so fear-provoking. She just was so scared that she would disappoint her family members. She realized that by saying yes to visiting family, she was continuing the cycle of Sunday dread and Monday exhaustion. By saying no to her family, she was experiencing a fear of disappointing them.

While we were working together, the scales finally tipped, and the pain of that Sunday dread and Monday exhaustion became intolerable. She had to put herself first, finally. We created a script that she would use to say the "no" she had been trying to say. We kept it simple and brief. We used very little to explain or rationalize, but rather just to be clear in the "no." We decided on a day and time that she would verbalize her no. We had her visualize the conversation and how it would go and how she would feel. We had her practicing saying the no as if her family was in front of her, and we had her do that a few times so that when the time finally came, it would be rehearsed, a bit more familiar, a bit less triggering to her body and a bit less activating in her body.

She finally said no to being with her family on Sundays. She finally got to the pool on Sundays. She finally relaxed, and she said this one simple shift in her week gave her back so much peace and contentment.

2. "How does growing up with conditional love — 'we're proud of you IF…' — wire us for approval-seeking as adults?"
I watched my dad's best friend's daughter get so much praise from my dad. She was part of the crowd, she was outspoken, she was articulate, she was eloquent. She was younger than me. I felt so envious. Who are we kidding? Let's call it jealous. I was jealous of her. She was getting my dad's approval and I wasn't, or at least that's what I thought. I mistook his approval of her as a lack of approval in me, and all I wanted was my daddy's love. All I wanted was for him to praise me and give me his approval.

I remember one time we were at a family party. In our culture, there's a lot of dancing at parties. Everyone was dancing. I was shy. I was standing in the corner. My dad came up to me and said, "Everybody's dancing. You should go out there too." Scared that I wouldn't get his approval, I went out there and danced, awkward, shy, hesitant, but dancing. I wouldn't say I necessarily was enjoying myself, but what choice did I have? I wanted his approval and his love.

Later in life, though my ex-husband and I had decided before marriage that we would not have children, he changed his mind after marriage and wanted children. I took this task on as if everything depended on it, and in my mind, continuing to receive his love was "everything.". I have no doubt that this belief system originated from my upbringing. There I was, in my forties, seeking my ex-husband's approval and love. I went to great lengths to try to have children, all because I wanted the love from him as well as my own parents, who were encouraging me to say yes to my husband's desires. I never thought what I was doing was only for others. I almost had convinced myself that I was trying to have children so that I could preserve my marriage and that was a good thing and that I was in my full agency.

What's actually true, as I reflect on it now, is that I was performing what was conditioned into me. I was agreeing to hormone injections, hormone pills, appointments, medical visits, ultrasounds, acupuncture, and chiropractic care, all while working full-time, just to try to get pregnant and keep his love. It was so extreme, but what's even more extreme is this is not something I even wanted. I had convinced myself that I should want it all because I was seeking the love and approval of my ex-husband and my parents.

3. "What are the hidden physical and mental health costs of constantly suppressing your needs to keep others happy?"

While trying to conceive, undergoing fertility treatments, working full-time, and dealing with discord in my marriage and with my in-laws. Every once in a while, I would feel tingling and numbness around my mouth and in my fingers, and sometimes in my back. I noticed I was having adult acne. I was withdrawing from social conversations, not wanting to engage with the people around me, neither at work nor outside of work.

I remember being referred to a neurologist to find out if I maybe had multiple sclerosis. I went through MRIs of my entire body, almost. They didn't find anything, not on the scans, anyways. Maybe it was the hormones, maybe it was the fertility treatments, but at one point I was referred to a psychiatrist because of uncontrollable crying, and I was told I had postpartum depression, which made me even more upset because I hadn't even delivered a child yet.

I walked into work one day, and the patient I had been trying to help through weekly appointments was telling me once again they had not been taking their medications. I found myself upset with the patient and taking my frustration out on them, raising my voice, sounding frustrated, and likely leaving them in a state of fear bigger than the fear of their HIV killing them. I had reached my limit. I couldn't go on any longer experiencing these symptoms, withdrawing from others, and taking out my frustration and my fears on my patients. I asked for a leave from work.

While on leave, I re-grouped and thankfully finally owned my own truth, which was the journey towards motherhood was not mine, and the career I had built was also not aligned. These statements are true. I no longer am in a relationship with that person. I'm no longer trying to conceive. I'm no longer working in that career. I no longer have numbness and tingling. I no longer have uncontrollable crying.

I suppose one could extrapolate that there was causality there. It's possible we will never know, but I think we know. The cost to my physical and mental health put me in grave danger, all just to preserve my marriage and to keep my parents and my in-laws happy.

4. "How do you start living for yourself when your entire identity has been built around what others expect of you?"

I looked around, and everyone there was similar to me. They thought like me; their belief systems were like mine. It wasn't until I entered online communities and eventually in-person events that I started to see people who didn't look like or think like me offer up their beliefs. I started hearing their beliefs, and something awakened in me when other people said things like:

I get to decide.
It's my choice.
I just decided.
I'm a grown ass woman.
I can do what I need to do for myself.
I don't care what other people think.

When I started hearing things like that, it awakened something in me, because it turns out I did have those belief systems inside of me. I just had never expressed them. I had never seen that being modeled to me, not by my mother, anyways. I heard these new beliefs and related to them. Once I realized I could relate to others' beliefs, I just decided to trust the quiet voices in my mind telling me that I have a choice and can decide for myself. I think those voices were always there. I had become good at ignoring those voices that surfaced in my quiet moments when I was alone. When I had time to be alone, I could hear those voices, but any time I was around other people, I favored their thoughts over what my quiet thoughts were telling me. Once I started hearing what others said in these new groups, I decided to give my quiet inner voices space, volume, and air time. I think our true identity is hiding in the quiet voices we have been ignoring.

5. "What's the difference between being kind and generous — and losing yourself trying to make everyone else comfortable?"
What if I didn't measure myself by how kind and generous I was? What if I flip that script? What if I measure my self-worth and my identity by being aligned and empowered?

Recently, I was in a relationship. In that relationship, I unknowingly let it consume me. More specifically, I let his emotional state dictate my actions. I found myself trying to do mental gymnastics to maintain peace in the relationship and to avoid conflict. I was also becoming frustrated with myself. I thought I had learned so much in my marriage - how to prioritize myself and my needs—yet here I am prioritizing someone else's needs again. This didn't make me feel proud of myself. I didn't feel empowered; I felt small; I felt like I was shrinking. Even I didn't want to be around me. I had gone back to the yardstick of being kind and generous and losing myself to please him, rather than the yardstick of being in alignment with myself.

I had to ask myself a different question. I couldn't continue asking myself, "Am I being kind? Am I being generous? Is everyone else comfortable?" I had to start asking myself, "Am I in alignment? Am I taking care of my needs and wants?"

I think it's time that, as women, we shift the target from kindness and generosity to alignment and empowerment.

To learn more and connect visit https://www.lifecoachingwithdrahluwalia.com/

VIOLETTE DE AYALAJune 8, 2026Comment