11 Signs You Were Raised To Be Helpful, Not Happy
Our own well-being should never be overlooked to accommodate someone else's.
A.Shvedov / Shutterstock As you were growing up, it was your parents’ job to raise you to be a self-sufficient, emotionally intelligent and compassionate human being. However, they may have gone a little too hard on the compassionate part, as some people were raised to be helpful, not happy.
There are many signs that indicate you were raised to care more for helping others than for making yourself happy that follow you well into adulthood. Even if being raised to be helpful seems admirable on the surface, when it becomes your primary identity and expectations, it can lead to long-term emotional issues that make it nearly impossible to find personal satisfaction. Being helpful can only be truly meaningful when it is balanced with self-awareness and self-care, and when the happiness of others doesn't come at the expense of your own.
Here are 11 signs you were raised to be helpful, not happy
1. You were always expected to share
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Parents who prioritized raising helpful individuals often instilled the idea that sharing is caring. While this is true to some extent, it can unintentionally send off the wrong message about boundaries, consent and ownership. Forcing children to share all of their belongings they aren’t ready to give up teaches them their consent or comfort ultimately don’t matter, and that they need to accommodate others no matter how they feel.
“Sharing is about giving. It’s about kindness. The problem is, it’s often wrapped in the idea kids have to oblige someone at a moment’s notice,” parenting coach Amy McCready shared on her site, Positive Parenting Solutions.
“Your son was busy playing, either lost in an imaginary world or just minding his own business, and is suddenly asked to stop because someone else wants the same toy. Why?”
Constantly expecting kids to share doesn’t teach them about generosity or being helpful. Instead, they learn that others have the right to undermine their personal boundaries, even into adulthood.
2. You feel guilty for saying no
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If you were raised to be more helpful than happy, you were likely taught to put others' needs before your own, even if it meant overstepping your own boundaries or comfort. If your parents needed you to babysit your younger siblings, you would have to cancel your plans to accommodate them rather than telling them no.
As an adult, you likely feel the same way, staying at work well-past your scheduled shift despite your exhaustion simply because your boss asked you to. However, any healthy relationship is going to require boundaries. Saying no to people filters out unhealthy dynamics where you are only valued based on how much you can give. It will also allow you to stay on track with your own personal goals in the long run.
“Consider setting boundaries around goals you have for yourself. For example, if one of your goals is to create a better work-life balance, you may say ‘no’ to a call or meeting outside your normal work hours,” MindMatters MenningerClinic shared.
Even if you were raised to feel guilty for saying no, you have to realize that saying no is not necessarily harshly rejecting others. It just helps you focus on what truly matters.
3. You feel responsible for others’ emotions
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If you were raised to be helpful and not happy, you were likely conditioned to believe that you were responsible for the emotions of others. If your mom was sad, it was your job to cheer her up. If your sibling was lonely, you had to swoop in and offer them company.
Your parents may have equated being helpful as being considerate and in tune with others’ emotions. They may have prioritized keeping others happy over themselves. However, being helpful can be tied more into empathy, where one is able to understand and be considerate of others’ feelings without the pressure of having to fix them.
Ultimately, we are not responsible for how others feel and it is certainly not our job to make them feel better, especially if it is at the expense of our own self-care and well-being.
4. You struggle to identify your own needs
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Since you were always putting others before yourself as a kid, it can be difficult to determine your own needs and wants. You were always expected to maintain the peace, help out others when they needed it and please authority figures. All of this can tune out your own needs and make them hard to identify.
However, our well-being is tied to having our own needs met and if we neglect them, how can we expect to be happy? People with a greater awareness of their needs are less likely to become stuck in negative emotions, report lower levels of worry, and are less anxious in social situations. Identifying your own needs and making them known to the people around you is not selfish. Just like everyone else you’ve helped, your needs should be supported and welcomed.
5. You apologize even when it’s not your fault
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If you were raised to be helpful and not happy, your parents may have expected you to be cooperative all of the time, even if it meant invalidating your emotions. Let’s say your cousin fell down the stairs and they falsely accused you of pushing them. Instead of hearing out your perspective, your parents may have forced you to apologize, making you believe it was what you needed to do to make others comfortable.
This deep-rooted emotional conditioning follows us into adulthood, and you may become hyper-responsible for others’ feelings, offering them endless apologies for something that is not even your fault. But over-apologizing does not make others more comfortable around you. In fact, it can make them think less of you.
According to psychotherapist Beverly Engel, over-apologizing isn’t that different from over-complimenting. You may think you’re displaying yourself as a nice and caring person, but you’re actually sending the message that you lack confidence and are ineffectual.
“It can even give a certain kind of person permission to treat you poorly, or even abuse you,” she warns in her book The Power of an Apology.
Instead of constantly resorting to apologies when they’re not needed, it is important to be self-aware of the things you can and cannot control. There is no need to say sorry for sneezing in public or standing in someone’s way without realizing, despite what you’ve been taught.
6. You fear being perceived as selfish for prioritizing yourself
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What your parents may have failed to realize when they were raising you to be helpful and not happy is that no one can ever be truly helpful if they never prioritize themselves. When you constantly give and give without replenishing, you will become burnt out and hinder your abilities to give authentically to others at your own mercy.
However, you may have been taught that focusing on yourself was selfish, and that the needs of others must come before your own. As adults, you may constantly be saying yes to plans despite your own exhaustion and emotional unavailability since you don’t want others to perceive you as selfish for taking a night off. These feelings can ultimately take a toll on your well-being.
“One risk of becoming lost in all the things we ‘should’ be doing for others is that we stop feeling for ourselves,” clinical psychologist Lisa Firestone. “To no surprise, research has shown that being kind to ourselves and practicing self-compassion improves our well-being. It also benefits the people around us. Researcher Kristin Neff has argued that having a kind attitude toward ourselves actually makes us better able to look at our mistakes and make real changes.”
If you ever want to be truly helpful, you owe it to yourself to be happy by focusing on what you need.
7. You suppress your emotions to keep the peace
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Parents who wanted to raise helpful and not happy kids often put an emphasis on maintaining the peace no matter how you may have felt. Instead of ever speaking up for yourself, you may suppress your true feelings for the sake of harmony. If your friend makes a belittling remark about your career that may have deeply hurt your feelings, you will likely blink back tears, put on a smile and laugh along with them to avoid causing a scene.
However, expressing our emotions is a natural right we have as humans, and suppressing them will only end up backfiring on us. “With suppression, you're trying to negate the emotion's existence—which, it turns out, isn't exactly possible, nor good for you,” psychotherapist Katherine (Schreiber) Cullen stated.
“Suppressing emotions increases our stress levels…This increase in stress helps explain why regular emotion suppressors tend to bring higher risks of heart disease and hypertension."
You will be much better off accepting and responding to your emotions, even if they may rock the peace. If your friend says something hurtful, call them out on it. A brief tension in the atmosphere is healthier than simmering in your pent up emotions and having to put on a front all of the time.
8. You feel uncomfortable asking for help
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If you were always taught to be the one lending help, it can be difficult to be on the receiving end. You may feel as if you’re not worthy of help, even if you desperately need it and would offer it to someone else in a heartbeat. Even if it may be uncomfortable asking for help, it doesn’t mean that you are any less deserving of it. We are social beings who are wired for connection. Asking for help is a natural part of how we thrive.
And when help is right in front of us, we aren’t going to deny it. You wouldn’t let yourself suffer after breaking your arm, you’d likely go to a hospital to get help. This need for help applies in all areas of life, and it is impossible to do absolutely everything on your own.
Needing help every now and then does not negate the fact that you would also give it to someone else.
9. You have trouble setting boundaries
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If you were raised to be helpful and not happy, you may have had difficulty establishing your own personal boundaries. You may have been taught that they could be perceived as rude, and that in order to be helpful, you must be willing to give all of yourself to someone. However, no relationship, whether it be with your parents, friends or romantic partners, will be able to thrive without clear boundaries. They are not about controlling others, they are about protecting your own well-being by clarifying what you are and are not okay with.
For example, you may set the boundary that you cannot stay out with your friends past a certain time since you have to wake up early for work in the morning. While your parents may have perceived this as rude behavior and inconsiderate to your friends, you are just setting fair expectations that reduce confusion and create clarity. There is nothing rude about wanting to get to bed early.
Even if it may be uncomfortable to set boundaries, it is important to remind yourself that you’re entitled to prioritize your own peace. Those who make you feel guilty about having boundaries are the ones who benefit from you having none.
10. You feel guilty for resting
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Resting is not a sign of being lazy, despite what your parents may have told you. They may have claimed that resting was just a waste of time that could’ve been spent being helpful.
However, taking a moment (or many moments) to recharge and re-energize is necessary if you want to maintain the well-being to be helpful.
Research demonstrates that failing to pause and give ourselves a rest only sets us further back.
“Neuroscience research shows that people who have an overactive default mode network (DMN) — the part of the brain responsible for self-reflection, future planning, and resting — are less happy,” wrote board-certified Harvard and Yale-trained psychiatrist, Marlynn Wei, MD, JD. “When we finally take a break, instead of feeling relaxed, our mind floods with anxious thoughts about what we should be doing.”
There is absolutely nothing wrong with turning your brain off for a little while and allowing yourself the rest you need to return to real life stronger, happier and even more helpful.
11. You avoid conflict even at your own expense
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Parents who prioritized being helpful over being happy likely encouraged you to keep the peace no matter what the expense. For example, if you are about to clock out of work and get some extra tasks dumped onto your plate, you may quietly just take up the extra projects without complaint to avoid being difficult or creating conflict.
However, you shouldn’t have to dismiss your own boundaries to make others comfortable. Refusing to assert yourself to keep the peace only sacrifices your time, energy and well-being. This will impact your overall happiness and ability to be genuinely helpful.
Megan Quinn is a staff writer with a bachelor's degree in English and a minor in Creative Writing. She covers news and lifestyle topics that focus on justice in the workplace, personal relationships, parenting debates, and the human experience.
