How to Stop Asking 'Are You Mad at Me?'

“Am I in trouble?” “Am I secretly bad?” These are questions Meg Josephson, a therapist and author, grew up asking herself. She was constantly trying to anticipate other people’s needs, worried that she was letting other people down. And it wasn’t until she found herself standing in the aisle of a Bed Bath & Beyond, trying to remember her favorite color, that she realized her desire to please everyone was eroding her sense of self.

On this episode of Modern Love, Josephson talks about how that realization led her to confront her tumultuous childhood, and what it took to stop “people pleasing.” She reads the Modern Love essay “My Three Years as a Beloved Daughter () ” by Erin Brown, about a woman who found a type of love in her best friend’s parents that she had never experienced before, and what that taught her about her own parents.

Josephson’s book, “Are You Mad At Me?,” is available Aug. 5, 2025.

Read more about Meg Josephson, and how to break the habit of people pleasing, in this article () by Jancee Dunn.

Here’s how to submit a Modern Love essay to The New York Times () .

Here’s how to submit a Tiny Love Story () .

Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts () or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.