DoorMats go out of their way to please everyone, trying to be a perfect people pleaser. That’s what I did when I lived in DoorMatville. I was always trying to be the perfect little pleaser to insure that everyone would like me. But I finallyrealized that I didn’t get the pleasure from pleasing everyone that Ithought I would.

People took advantage of me, which made me feel bad. And it was stressful to always be worried about other people. If my efforts to be perfect didn’t please someone, it got frustrating. So I was unhappy a lot as I strove to be perfect at pleasing people.

As I began to leave DoorMatville I recognized I didn’t have to be a perfect little pleaser anymore to gain acceptance from others and the most important person to get acceptance from is me. It was an interesting discovery that was triggered by beginning to love myself. The more I wanted to be kind to me, the more my focus switched off of being a perfect people pleaser.

Now I’m imperfectly pleasing. I try to help others when I can but people know I may say “no” to requests, which is OK. My real friends accept that. The people I don’t need in my life may not. When you become imperfect, you learn who your real friends.

Since achieving perfection is impossible, trying to be a perfect pleaser will eventually backfire in the sense it won’t make you feel the security you hope for. One mistake can make you feel like a loser. Disappointing someone can scare you. Jumping for everyone’s needs can exhaust you. And worst of all, being a perfect pleaser usually means not pleasing yourself, which isn’t the perfect way to please.

In order to be happy, it’s important to make pleasing yourself your number one priority. I may be imperfectly pleasing if I turn someone down in order to do something for me or because it’s something I just don’t want to do. Accepting that it’s OK to be imperfectly perfect is relaxing since you’re not always having to be ready to jump when someone calls.

Give yourself permission to not have to be perfect about pleasing others. Begin to love yourself enough to not burden yourself with that task. Of course you shouldn’t try to be perfect about how you treat yourself too. Begin to set boundaries on what you do for others. Practice saying, “no” to what you don’t want to do. Love yourself enough to accept yourself as imperfect Take the SLM’s pledge to start 2014 with 32 days of self-love. Make one of those things dropping the need for perfection about making other happy. Make yourself happy!

Write down in a place you can see it, “I must make myself #1 in my life.” Then you can be the best kind of imperfectly perfect.
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Join The Self-Love Movement™! Take the 31 Days of Self-Love Commitment—“I commit to do my best to do something loving for myself, however big or small, for the next 31 days.” and get my book, How Do I Love Me? Let Me Count the Ways for free at http://howdoiloveme.com. Read my 2014 31 Days of Self-Love Posts HERE. Join the Self-Love Movement™! on Facebook. Watch the video made with Hoobastank’s song–The reason–that illustrates the power of self-love.