Dear Therapist:

I’ve always taken pride in being someone others can rely on. Lately, though, I find myself agreeing to things even when I don’t have the capacity and then scrambling or canceling later. How can someone who genuinely wants to help others learn to set clear, sustainable boundaries and say no earlier, without guilt or damaging relationships?

Response:

A key word in your question is “wants.” You say that you genuinely want to help others, but this appears to conflict with your own needs, boundaries, and available time. This makes me wonder whether the word you should be using is “needs.”

In my vernacular, the difference between “needs” and “wants” is that the former relates to our emotional experiences—our insecurities, triggers, fears, and underlying feelings. When we want something, it is theoretically something we would like but are ultimately okay without. When we need something, however, not having it makes us feel badly—often guilty or worthless.

The reason I use the word “theoretically” is that a pure need or a pure want is highly unusual. We are not automatons; as humans, our minds are a complex mix of thought and emotion. Thus, there is rarely such a thing as an absolute emotional need with no element of want, or an absolute want with no emotional component. We do, however, often lean heavily in one direction or the other.

When we are largely responding to an emotional need, it becomes important to identify, challenge, and address that need. Doing so can help us change unwanted automatic thoughts—such as, “My entire identity is based on helping others; if I can’t be everything to everyone, I’m worthless.” Often, these thoughts operate outside conscious awareness, yet with introspection we begin to recognize their emotional influence.

As in many areas of life, we sustain emotion–thought–action cycles. For instance, if I feel worthless when I am not helping others, then on some level I believe this to be true. That belief creates a need to help, which reinforces both the emotion and the thought. Each part of the cycle strengthens the others. As with any cycle, identifying and understanding one or more components is the first step toward changing it into a healthier one.

You mention that you have always taken pride in being reliable. I wonder to what extent this has become more than simple pride and instead a central aspect of your identity. This, too, can form a cycle. If your positive self-concept is largely based on reliability, you may unconsciously equate being less available with being less worthy. You may also project this belief onto others, assuming they evaluate you the same way. This creates a self-perpetuating loop: you feel compelled to help others in order to maintain your sense of self, which further strengthens the belief that your worth depends on doing so.

As this cycle continues, you may feel an increasing need to reinforce each part of it—doing more for others while tying your identity ever more tightly to being dependable.

Aside from sacrificing your own needs to sustain this spiraling pattern, you may ultimately be moving toward an inability to help others at all as burnout develops.

Burnout is usually emotionally driven. It is not typically caused by the tasks or social demands themselves, but by how we emotionally interpret and experience them—particularly when they feel like needs rather than choices.

As you begin to understand your needs and gradually shift them toward wants, you can create healthier, more sustainable cycles. Developing intrinsically based self-esteem—grounded not in what you do, but in who you are—can support this process and make setting boundaries feel less like rejection and more like balance.

-Yehuda Lieberman, LCSW

 psychotherapist in private practice

 Woodmere, NY

 adjunct professor at Touro University

 Graduate School of Social Work

 author of Self-Esteem: A Primer

 www.ylcsw.com / 516-218-4200