My Human Design report has a section called Emotional Intelligence. Sounds respectable, doesn't it? Something you'd happily put on your professional bio.
Then you get to the unhealthy list.
Pretending to be nice. Avoiding confrontation. Not saying the thing that might cause an upset.
This is SO me!!!
This is from my own chart report. The section describes my undefined Solar Plexus centre. You don't need to know your way around a Human Design chart to understand what caught my attention. And I need to be specific here. I used to pretend to be nice to those who wronged me. Just to keep the peace.
It was beaten into me as the thing to do as a child. But I am no victim. I have left that story behind.
Seeing that frequency in my chart? I now understand why it took SO long to shift my identity out of that behaviour.
Pretending to be nice.
Keeping the peace sounds so reasonable. Considerate. Excellent at reading the room. Something that lets the Good Girl keep her professional reputation.
I used to call this keeping the peace. Whose peace, though? Certainly not mine.
Kindness can tell the truth. It can say, "That isn't included." It can disagree with a client. It can charge the price without making a little apology out of the last sentence.
The Good Girl is checking whether everyone's still pleased with her.
In a business, that can look very competent. Responsive. Flexible. Lovely to work with. Who's going to complain about the woman who keeps making things easier for them?
Meanwhile, the price changes. The scope grows. The opinion gets softened until there's barely an opinion left. Nobody had to order her to do it. The possibility of an upset was enough.
There's the switch. The answer's there, but before it comes out of my mouth I'm considering whether you'll be upset. You can call it diplomacy. Sometimes it is. But sometimes you're choosing their response before you've even given them anything to respond to.
And somehow, their imagined disappointment gets a vote in your business.
This is why the other side of that report matters to me. Does saying goodbye to the Good Girl mean confrontation? Arguments? Having to become someone who enjoys a fight? The report says "emotionally quiet and detached". Quiet! That caught my attention. She can feel for someone without joining their drama. She's willing to say what needs saying, and another person's mood doesn't get to decide for her.
I like her.
She can care that you're disappointed without immediately changing her decision. She doesn't need to produce an upset to prove she's strong. She just doesn't make preventing one her job.
That's the woman I want making the decisions.
Because a brand built around how agreeable you are leaves very little room for what you actually think. Especially when your work involves helping other women stop shrinking to fit other people's expectations of them.
I can't make agreeableness the condition of my own voice and then sell you the freedom to use yours.
My chart gave me language for that contradiction, and for a behaviour I've already worked to leave behind. It didn't make the decision for me. I still have to notice when I'm being nice to avoid an upset. Kill the switch. Say the thing.
Clearly. Without a performance. Without adding six more sentences to make the first one acceptable.
I'd rather be known for what I do than how comfortably I let everyone else do what they want.
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