When many parents praise their children, the most common thing they hear is “My child is the most sensible.” However, have you ever thought about whether being “too sensible” is really a good thing? Some people may think this is a form of appreciation, but this must also be from the perspective of some parents. If the child is sensible enough, you can worry less, don’t have to work hard for the child’s daily life, and make yourself exhausted every day, and you can have more time for yourself. Children can even share some daily chores for themselves, or provide them with emotional value.

However, these conveniences are based on the children’s efforts. Of course, this does not mean that children should not think about their parents, but that they should have a “degree”. Because a child is too sensible and takes on too many problems that do not belong to his or her age group, it will easily affect his or her interpersonal relationships and intimacy as an adult.

Children Who Are Too Sensible Are Equipped with “Emotional Radar” in Their Bodies

I once read a question in an article: Are parents more concerned about their children’s daily activities, or are children more concerned about what their parents are thinking? Most people would think that it is parents who pay more attention to their children because every parent does not want their children to be wronged or treated badly.

But they rarely think about the problem from the perspective of a child. Even if they do, they think that the child only needs to wait for the parents to give. But in fact, children cannot accept it with peace of mind. While they enjoy what their parents give, they will also care and pay more attention to their parents.

For example, they will always pay attention to their parents’ emotional changes. If their parents are unhappy, they will try their best to make them happy. Therefore, many children will acquire a superpower as they grow up, that is, they are very good at observing words and colors.

Many parents think that their children do not understand this, and often complain about life in front of their children without paying attention. For example, if I am too tired every day, I cannot be sensible and often vent my negative emotions on my children. But in fact, children will remember it in their hearts and hope to protect the family through their efforts.

The famous German psychologist Hellinger once said: “Children are the protectors of the family.” When the relationship between parents is imbalanced, many children will make some self-sacrifice and try their best to repair their parents’ emotions and protect the family. There is a term called “parentification”, also known as “parentification”. It refers to the phenomenon that children and adolescents exceed their development level and prematurely assume the role of parents and assume adult responsibilities. This kind of relationship model that puts the cart before the horse can easily cause a child to be too sensible and grow into a highly sensitive, please-pleaser personality, overly responsible, overly responsible, and good at reading other people’s eyes.

Internal Relationship Patterns Also Extend to Intimate Relationships

The relationship model a person builds with his parents in childhood will extend to the relationship model he builds with everyone as an adult. This means that if a child is too precocious and sensible in childhood, he will always be in the position of a giver and caregiver in the relationship with his parents. Then, when he grows up, he will also show such a state of being overly conscientious in everything at work, interpersonal relationships, and intimate relationships.

Some people may question, isn’t it good to do one’s duty at work? Of course, there is nothing wrong with this, but because you have acquired a mentality of being overly responsible for the lives of others since you were young, this phenomenon of misplaced responsibility will still appear at work. For example, if you make some mistakes while partnering with a colleague, it is clear that your colleague is also responsible, but you will habitually take all the responsibility and mistakes on yourself. You will think that you are the one who has caused your colleagues, so you will take all the responsibilities alone.

And this kind of sacrifice may not necessarily win the gratitude of colleagues. If the other party makes a mistake, they may shift the responsibility to themselves again. As a result, this kind of over-responsible thinking will make your life anxious and exhausting, and you still won’t know what to do to protect your rights and interests.

Because over-responsibility thinking has become a habit, as long as you don’t self-attribute and take responsibility, you will feel sorry for someone. The same goes for entering into an intimate relationship. The relationship between people will be in such a state that when you are habitually always in the perspective of a giver, then the other party will unconsciously stand in the perspective of a taker.

If your partner is a person with clear responsibilities, he will take the initiative to take responsibility in the relationship, not evade or shirk, and be willing to pay. But if your partner is a person with blurred lines of responsibility in the relationship, he will continue to take and take away, consuming the giver. Moreover, usually, a person who is used to giving in a relationship will find a lover with blurred boundaries of responsibility, because being with such a person is a relationship model that the giver is familiar with.

But givers will not always give willingly, because any contribution is expected in return. Being sensible and dedicated in childhood can gain the happiness, admiration, and love of parents. After adulthood, you will continue to build relationships in this flattering way. If you don’t get the response you want, you will feel resentful and internally consumed. But I don’t know how to maintain relationships in other ways. I only learned this way in childhood. And this is also the bad impact caused by a child who becomes too sensible and becomes “parental” from an early age.

Because children cannot take their own feelings and needs as the premise during their growth stage and habitually take care of their parents’ feelings, they have not established their own sense of subjectivity, value and security. So they are afraid of disharmonious factors in the relationship, so they are very observant and very sensitive. It’s like having an emotional radar in your body that can keenly sense the emotional changes of people around you.

Whether in the workplace or in an intimate relationship, people will continue to suppress their feelings and habitually build relationships through giving, pleasing, and misplaced responsibilities. Then, in the unequal relationship that they have built, they will be continuously exploited, demanded, and internally consumed, leaving themselves in pain and unable to extricate themselves.

So, how do you get rid of this “savior mentality” that you have built since childhood and stop yourself from continuing to build it again?

Don’t Hate Yourself for Being Too Sensible

When you always build relationships from a giver and overly responsible perspective, you will hate yourself. This way of building a relationship through constant giving will cause you to fall into internal friction, and the relationship will not become better because of your efforts but will become worse in various ways, and it will be difficult for you to change yourself.

At this time, a person will hate himself very much. But in fact, these traits weren’t actually bad at one time. They actually protected you during your childhood. When you were a child, you were still very weak and did not have more ability or strength to bear the uncertainty and fear brought to you by your family, so you could only protect it in this way. When you become an adult, your inner child has not grown up and is still stuck in the weak moments of childhood. You feel that all relationships require you to give and please to be harmonious.

Therefore, this is not your fault. Don’t hate and despise the once weak self. When you were young, you were only using the power within your abilities to protect. If you want to change and heal yourself now, you need to first accept the part of yourself that makes you feel bad now. When you no longer reject and hate your cowardice, inferiority, and flattery, but see the inner metaphors behind these behaviors, real change will occur.

Tell Yourself That You Are No Longer the Weak Self You Once Were

When I was young, I could only protect the harmony of my family sacrificially. But now you are no longer a weak child, so we need to be aware of this and stop using the old way to build all relationships. You have grown up and have the resources, strength, and ability to live a better life.

In Relationships, Learn to Have Clear Responsibilities

Everyone has their life issues, and you should not be responsible for and pay for other people’s life issues and responsibilities. Instead, you must learn to take responsibility for your life responsibilities. When the boundaries are clear and the responsibilities are clear, you can be freed from the ambiguous logic of the relationship.

Therefore, be brave. When you encounter a responsibility that does not belong to you next time, pause for a moment. Don’t rush to take responsibility, but also dare to refuse. Only if you bravely guard your boundaries and don’t take responsibility will you gain true relief. At this time, all interpersonal relationships will become refreshing and crisp.