Mother Wounds: Can A Man Have The Need To Please Others If He Had An Emotionally Unstable Mother?

What a man may find, if he were to step back and reflect on his life, is that he has the tendency to focus on other people’s needs and to do what he can to please them. This can be what takes place when he is at work, around friends and is in an intimate relationship.

As a result of this, he is not going to freely express himself; he will be who he thinks he should be. A number of his own needs are then going to be overlooked, which will cause him to be deprived.

Another Part

Additionally, he can find that he has the need to make sure that he doesn’t say or do anything that might unsettle another. Due to this, it can be as though he is often walking on eggshells.

A lot of his attention is then going to be directed to another or others, with very little being directed toward his. In other words, he will spend a lot of time being outer-directed as opposed to inner-directed.

A Bleak Existence

Thanks to how he typically behaves, he is likely to often feel frustrated, angry and drained. But, as a number of his needs will seldom if ever be met, this is to be expected.

If he was completely happy about what is going on, it would show that something wasn’t right. Most likely, it would show that his true self is being completely dominated by his false self.

The Outcome

In this case, he might not have a smile on his face all the time or always feel good, but he wouldn’t have the need to change his life. He would be pretty lifeless but he would just put up with what is going on.

So, as he is not happy with what is going on, it is a clear sign that his connection to his true self has not been completely severed. Therefore, as bleak as his life will be, at least he will be aware that he is living in the wrong way and have the desire to do something about it.

What’s going on?

At this point, he could wonder why he behaves in this way and doesn’t freely express himself around others. What could enter his mind is that he needs to stop trying to please others and worrying about upsetting them.

He could think about how even if he doesn’t please them or upset them, he is not going to die. He could also think about how there might be conflict and that the worst-case scenario is that he might fall out with someone, but that’s as far as it will go.

A Strange Scenario

For him to gain a deeper understanding of why he is this way, he can think about what his early years were like. This may have been a time when he didn’t feel safe enough to be in his body and freely express himself.

Instead, he might have needed to live in his head and more or less always be alert, while doing what he could to make sure that he pleased another or others. This would have been a way for him to avoid being rejected and abandoned and even harmed.

A Closer Look

What this can show is that he was brought up by a mother who was emotionally unstable. It would then have been normal for her to be calm in one moment and to be all at sea at another.

During the moments when she wasn’t calm, she might have been critical and verbally abusive. Along with this, there might have been moments when she left him alone.

A Brutal Time

A stage of his life when he needed a mother who he felt safe around, could attach to and was attentive, was then a stage of his life when he had a mother who he didn’t feel safe around, couldn’t attach to and was inattentive. This would have caused him to be greatly deprived and deeply wounded.

How he felt and a number of his needs would have ended up being repressed by his brain. And, this would have played a part in pushing him out of his body and into his head.

The Past Is Present

Now, many years will have passed since he lived in an environment where not pleasing another person would have caused him to suffer and even put his survival at risk but a big part of him won't realise this. To this part of him, not being focused on others and adapting to them will be seen in the same way.

For him to no longer behave in the same way, he is likely to have pain to face and work through and unmet development needs to experience. This will take courage, patience and persistence.

Awareness

If a man can relate to this and he is ready to change his life, he may need to reach out for external support. This is something that can be provided with the assistance of a therapist or healer.