Latest / RiseUp - Live Joy Your Way / The Emotional Over-Functioner: Ending the Cycle of Relationship Exhaustion
Transcript
- Voiceover: [00:00:00] Rise Up Live, Joy Your Way from emotional intelligence through cognitive distortions, certified life and wellness coach Kamini Wood is on a mission to help people see the magnificence of their own unique human spirit. Through these small bites of self visualization and self-confidence, you can have healthy relationships, success in business and career, and live the life you want to live, Rise Up, Live Joy Your Way. Kamini Wood: Hi there, and welcome to another episode of Rise Up, Live Joy your way, whether it's morning, afternoon, or evening. Thank you for taking some time to just hang out here with me today. Now, today I wanna talk about something. Um, you know, that I've noticed there are people in many families, friendships, and workplaces who quietly take on a role that they never officially agreed to. Uh, and I've noticed this in a lot of my coaching conversations as my clients are talking to me and sharing with me, and the role that they take on is being the emotionally responsible [00:01:00] one, the one who keeps the peace, the one who notices when tension is building and tries to smooth things over. The one who explains misunderstandings, the one who makes sure everyone else feels okay. And so from the outside it looks like ki kindness or maturity or emotional intelligence. But underneath that role, many people carry a kind of exhaustion that. Others don't see, because constantly managing the emotional climate of relationships requires an enormous amount of energy. And when someone becomes the emotionally responsible one, something subtle begins to happen. They start carrying the emotional weight that was actually not even theirs to begin with. And so I just wanna talk about the exhaustion that comes. With being the emotionally responsible one in relationships. Now, many people find themselves in this role and they don't notice it at first. It often develops slowly. Maybe you are the one who senses tension between people, and so you step in to to calm things down. Maybe you're the one who checks in on everyone's else's feelings. Maybe you're the one who apologizes first. When you're not entirely sure [00:02:00] what you did wrong, and over time people begin to rely on you for that role, right? They trust that you're gonna be the one to keep things stable. They trust that you're the one who's gonna step in to help resolve conflict. They trust that you're the one who's emotionally aware and the emotionally intelligent one. And again, there's nothing wrong with that because, you know, being thoughtful about other people's feelings, I mean, that. That actually matters. Empathy is a beautiful thing. But when someone becomes the responsible one for managing the emotions of everyone around them, now the balance of the relationship starts to shift. Um, you know, instead of the relationships feeling mutual and reciprocal, one person starts carrying most of the emotional labor. And that can actually start to become exhausting over time because, you know, people who, who become the emotionally responsible one. Um, you know, oftentimes when we, when this comes up in conversation and we start talking about. Just the past and, and family of origin and things like that. We noticed that oftentimes it's a pattern from earlier in life. Sometimes it develops in families where emotions felt unpredictable. [00:03:00] Maybe there's a parent whose mood could shift quickly. Maybe conflict was intense or overwhelming. Maybe there was a sense that someone needed to keep things calm. So children in those environments often become the one who's highly attuned to all of those emotional signals. They're the ones who notice any slight change in tone. They're the ones who can pick up attention in the room. They learn to anticipate reactions, and because they're so perceptive, they begin to try to stabilize the entire, the environment They. You know, will, they will apologize. They'll say like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Um, because they're trying to avoid conflict before it actually begins. And this over time, what ends up happening is this beco becomes the emotional skill, right? It becomes this responsibility that they start taking on and they were never actually meant to carry it, but. You know, they do as children and then as they grow older, that same pattern often follows them into their adult relationships. And I'm, when I say adult relationships, I, I can, it can mean workplace relationships, friendships, romantic relationships, all of the relationships. And that's where the deeper challenge begins to. To [00:04:00] appear because when someone becomes the emotionally responsible one, they start believing something about relationships. They start believing it's their job to keep everything stable. So if someone is upset, they try to fix it. If there's tension, they try to resolve it, and someone reacts strongly, they assume they must have done something wrong. And so over time, they begin to monitor the emotional state of everyone around them, and then they start to adjust their tone, or they choose their words carefully, or they try to prevent misunderstandings before they happen. But the truth is, emotional responsibility and relationships is. It. It's meant to be shared If we're in relationship, both people have a part in the relationship, right? Each person is responsible for their own emotions. Each person is responsible for how they respond to situations. Each person is responsible for how they show up in the dynamic. And when one person takes on the role of the emotional stabilizer for everyone else, that relationship becomes unbalanced and the person carrying that role often begins to feel. Tired in ways that they struggle to explain because emotional labor is real work even when no one else [00:05:00] notices that it's happening. I often hear this pattern when someone describes feeling overwhelmed in relationships. They say something like, I feel like I'm always the one trying to make things better. Or I'm always the one who has to explain things or smooth things over. Or if I don't keep things calm, everything's gonna fall apart. And when we explore those statements more closely, we start to see that they have quietly taken on the responsibility of, for the emotional functioning of the relationship. And this can happen, uh, with two parents and a child. For instance, you know, one parent is trying to manage the relationship of the other two, right? The other parent and the child, because they start to feel responsible for. Maybe how their co-parent is responding to the child or the child, to the parent. That's exhausting to manage that relationship, but they feel responsible and they're, they feel responsible for preventing conflict, responsible for keeping everyone comfortable. And while that may. Keep things stable in the short term. It also creates this really heavy emotional burden [00:06:00] because no one, one person can control all of that. You know, you don't actually have control over the emotional state of somebody else around you, nor should you have to. Psychologically speaking. The pattern is closely related to something often described as emotional overfunctioning. When one person begins to manage the emotional dynamics of a relationship, other people unconsciously begin to do less. They begin to carry less of that burden, not because they're, they're trying to be malicious, but because the dynamic allows 'em to do that, right? It's a form of enabling the emotional responsible person anticipates problems, fixes the misunderstandings, keeps the conversation calm. And because that role is reliable, others may lean into it without even realizing it. And that dynamic shows up in, in people pleasing, it shows up in fawning. So when someone senses potential conflict, their nervous system moves quickly into repair mode. They might start apologizing. They soften their words. They try to restore harmony as quickly as possible because again, this response develop, it is often developed as a way of maintaining safety in the [00:07:00] relationships, but when it becomes the default pattern, it prevents relationships from actually being healthy and developing a balanced sense of responsibility. So if this pattern feels familiar, there are a few things that you can reflect on in your relationships. You often feel like you're responsible for keeping the emotional atmosphere stable. Do you find yourself trying to fix other people's reactions or moods? When conflict appears, do you feel pressure to resolve things quickly or do you allow them to naturally return to calm on their own? And do you allow other people to take responsibility for their emotional reactions and responses? Because if relationships become healthier, when that emotional responsibility is shared and both people are taking responsibility for how they're showing up. Now if you recognize this pattern in yourself, there are a few things that you could potentially shift. The first one is noticing when you automatically move into emotional repair mode, like notice when it's this immediate thing, when tension appears, do you immediately start trying to fix it, or do you give yourself permission to pause and allow all other people to participate [00:08:00] in resolving the situation? The second thing, recognize the difference between empathy and responsibility. Right. You can care about someone's feelings, but you don't have to be responsible for managing them or fixing them. Those are two very different roles, and the third shift is allowing space for other people to actually take ownership of regulating their own emotions. Sometimes relationships do become healthier when we step back slightly and allow other people to take ownership for how they're showing up. It's not about detaching. Um, so that we're no longer in the relationship, but it's allowing room and it's allowing you to build trust with that other person and allowing them to also take on some emotional responsibility so that you can have a more balanced dynamic if you've spent years being the emotionally responsible one. It, it makes sense that the role feels natural. I always go back to the nervous system, right? We learned how to stay safe. So your nervous system learned that maintaining harm harmony was important, and that is reflected in how you show up with your empathy and your awareness. But [00:09:00] relationships do not become stronger when one person carries all of the emotional weight. They become stronger when it's mutual and it's shared, and you're allowed to care deeply of four people and about people without managing every emotional outcome. And you're allowed to step out of the role of the emotional stabilizer. And you're allowed to trust that healthy relationships can handle moments of discomfort while people work through things together. Being emotionally aware is absolutely a strength. Let me be super clear about that. Empathy is absolutely an a strength. I'm not saying that those are not good things, but when we lean too far into it, and e empathy turns into constant responsibility for someone else's emotions, it can drain you and it can exhaust you. Healthy relationships do not require one person to hold everything together. They grow when everyone participates, and sometimes the most powerful shift that we can make is realizing that. Caring about others does not mean caring everything for them because relationships do become healthier [00:10:00] when everyone in the relationship is involved. If you'd like to chat more about how coaching can help support you through this or something else, feel free to book a time with me at anytime at coachwithkamini.com, and until next time, stay well. Voiceover: Thank you for listening to Rise Up Live Joy Your Way. For more information, Book a chat with Kamini at www.chatwithKamini.com, or visit her website at www.kaminiwood.com. You can also find Kamini on Facebook or Instagram username, it's authentic me. Thank you for listening!