Ep 10 Unlearning the Need To Be Liked A Soulful Rebellion_

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Unlearning the Need to Be Liked: A Soulful Rebellion is a heartfelt, 7-part journey for the woman who is ready to stop performing, stop shrinking, and start living as her truest self. In each 15-minute episode, Maxine Bingham speaks with honesty, compassion, and understanding — guiding you through the quiet but radical act of reclaiming your voice, your boundaries, and your peace. You’ll explore the hidden cost of being liked, the survival roots of people-pleasing, the exhaustion of constant performance, and the courage it takes to say your sacred yes and unapologetic no. Through personal stories, gentle reflections, and grounding meditations, this series becomes more than a podcast — it’s a permission slip to come home to yourself, one breath at a time. 

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Transcript

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Hi, welcome back to Soulfully Aligned. My name is Maxine Bingham, and today's episode is titled On Learning, the Need to Be Liked, a Soulful Rebellion, the Price of Being Liked. I wanna start this episode, not with a point, but with a confession. I still crave being light. I said it, and not in the social media kind of way. It's not about likes on a post. I mean, being liked in being accepted, being invited, being understood, being the woman. Others speak fondly in rooms. I am not. Sometimes I still tend to twist myself into shapes I know are too small, just so I can feel safe in someone else's eyes. But the more I do that, the more I feel like a stranger in my own body. Have you ever felt that way? That quiet little ache after you have said yes, knowing that you really truly wanted to say no. That silent grief when you get complimented for how easy you are and something inside you flinches, because being easy is cost you everything you see. There was a time that I thought my being liked meant that I was lovable. And that keeping the peace meant that I was worthy of belonging. But now I know the truth. I know that being liked is cheap. If it comes at the cost of my own truth, and it's not just tiring, it is erasing. This episode is not a pep talk. What it is is a sacred rebellion. Not a war with others, but a gentle firm uprising within yourself to reclaim the parts of you that are done disappearing to speak to the version of you that's still waiting to be chosen by no one else but yourself. If you're not your head at this moment. Even crying a little because it's hidden too close to home. I want you to know this. You are not alone. You are not wrong. You are not broken. You are just ready. And you know what? I too am ready with you. So let's talk about the inherited script when liking becomes survival. I want us to talk about how deep this actually goes. This need to be liked. It didn't just pop up one day. It didn't come from vanity or you being insecure. It came from you wanting to survive from little girls who learned very early. That pleasing meant peace. That approval meant access. Being agreeable was safer than being your authentic selves. I think about that girl that I used to be the one who learned to measure her volume. Not because she was loud, but because her truth made people uncomfortable. The one who learned to say yes with her mouth while screaming no inside her chest. The one who sat quietly in rooms where she should have been celebrated, not because she didn't have something to say, but because she was already too familiar with the punishment of being bold. And if I'm being absolutely honest, I still carry that little girl Sometimes she shows up when I get that pit in my stomach. After setting a boundary, she shows up. When I get the urge to overexplain or fix someone else's discomfort, she shows up when I'm left out and I take it very personally. We inherited this grip from mothers, teachers, churches, relationships, all unintentionally passing down the message. Be nice, be small. Be liked, but you know what else? I'm beginning to realize that we can be the ones to rewrite it. We can look at that little girl in her eye, the one who kept everyone happy, and we can say to her, you did your best, but I've got it from here. We don't have to keep earning our place. We belong as we are. Period. I want you to let that sink in for a moment. Part two, the exhaustion of performance. You know what's worse than being tired? It's being tired and pretending that you are not waking up and putting on your face that looks together. Smiling at work when you're running on fumes saying it's no problem when you know that it is just not one that you feel allowed to have. I wanna tell you about a night that I broke down and it wasn't in public, it wasn't in front of anyone, but it was in my bathroom. I locked the door, I sat on the edge of the tub. And I just kept weeping, and it's not because anyone had hurt me, it was because I kept abandoning myself and I finally begin to feel it. The mask had gotten so heavy. The woman, everyone liked, she was actually lonely, the one they called so easy to talk to. She was feeling invisible. The one they leaned on for everything. She just couldn't feel her own weight anymore. Performing likability is a full-time job and the benefits are trash. We don't get real intimacy. We don't get real rest. We don't get to be known. So why are we even doing it? I think part of us is still afraid. Afraid that if we stop performing, that we are gonna lose everyone around us and we will. But here is the hard, holy truth. If someone only loves you when you are agreeable, that is not love. It's convenience. So my advice to you is let them go. Let the mask that you have been wearing go and I want you to let your truth begin to rise. And if you are tired, deeply tired, you don't need a break. You just need permission. Permission to be real. To be seen, to be held. And you know what? Here, that's what I am giving you permission. Part three, the grief of letting go. Let's name it healing. It can hurt not because you're doing it wrong, but because you're finally beginning to tell the truth. You're finally facing the reality that some relationships only existed because you didn't tell the truth. Some friendships. Only thrived because you didn't set boundaries. Some people only stayed close because you kept abandoning yourself to make room for them. And now that you are showing up, honestly, now they want to leave you. And I know it hurts this grief. It isn't just about them. It's about her, the version of you who smiled through silence, who carried everyone else's pain while she tucked her own under the bed. You're saying goodbye to her. And while that's liberating, it's also gutting. So please, I don't want you to rush through this part. I want you to allow yourself to cry for the girl who held it all together. Let yourself mourn the rooms where you were tolerated, but you were never, ever seen, and let yourself fall apart just a little. It's sacred and it's absolutely necessary. Grief is not. You regressing. It's the sound of your soul rearranging itself. And you know what? You don't have to bounce back. This isn't a bounce back story. This is a story about your becoming part four, rebuilding from the inside out. This is where it starts to get really quiet. Not because there's nothing left, but because now you're listening. Now you are really listening to the voice underneath it all. What do I need today? What do I actually want? What makes me feel most like myself? Those are questions that I have asked myself, and I can actually remember the first time that I asked those questions. What was even more scary to me is that I didn't have an answer. It was because I had spent so long tuning out my own voice that I forgot what it actually sounded like. This part of the journey is not one that's glamorous. It's not one that's quick, but it's one that's yours and that makes it holy. Maybe you start taking walks without your phone. Maybe you'll begin to wear clothes that make you feel like you, not just what's acceptable to those around you or you field that's acceptable to society. Maybe you change how you speak. How you show up and how you pray, because that is all a part of the return. You'll know your healing when you stop apologizing for saying no. When you no longer feel guilty for needing your own space. When you begin to choose peace, not as some form of performance. But as a practice, rebuilding isn't about becoming anyone new. It's about coming back to who you were before the world began to edit you and told you who to be Part five. The Sacred Yes, and the Unapologetic. No. This is where the rebellion now begins to take root. You've let go, you've grieved. You have started to rebuild, and now you start to own it. You start to say no without feeling the need to backtrack. You start to say yes to things that only nourishes your spirit. Not just what's on your schedule. You stop chasing closure. You stop managing everyone else's perception of you. You rest, you pause, you receive, and it's in that quiet that you will begin to realize something even more powerful, and that is. You don't need to be liked In order for someone to love you, you don't need to be needed for them to see you as worthy. You don't need to be perfect just to be chosen. You are already chosen. You are chosen by the God you serve, by grace, by the sacred breath that lives inside you. The breath that hasn't stopped whispering for you to come back home to the woman that you were created to be. In closing, I want to do a guided meditation with you to help you to return to yourself. I want you to breathe in and now release. If you can close your eyes, picture the version of you that doesn't need to be liked to be at peace. She is standing tall. She's rooted in her own truth. She no longer waits for permission to be. Place your hand over your heart and whisper to yourself. I am coming home. I will not abandon you for someone else's approval ever again. You are safe. You are sacred. You are whole. Sit with her. Sit with the real you and know this. You are not too much. You are most certainly not unkind, and you are not broken. What you are my beautiful sisters is you are now free and you are soulfully aligned. Thank you so much for joining me on this journey, and I will see you in the next episode.