#5: Good Girls Are Always Needed, Rarely Chosen with Dr Michelle McQuaid

October 12, 2025

In this episode, Dr Michelle McQuaid reveals the research behind the good girl phenomenon: how we're groomed from childhood, what it costs us, and why 60% of Australian women silence their true feelings to avoid being abandoned.

Michelle breaks down the three core good girl behaviours (performing perfectly, pleasing others, silencing ourselves) and their antidotes, and teaches us the U-turn technique for those moments when we feel pressured to be good instead of real.

This is about understanding that feeling "not enough" isn't a personal failing — we were taught to feel this way. And there are practical, evidence-based strategies to reclaim our worth.

Key Quotes

"By the age of 11, most girls have learned to give up their knowing in order to fit in."

"We were groomed. It's not a personal failing — we were taught to feel this way."

"Always needed, rarely chosen. It feels like it would be better to be needed than never chosen at all. But it keeps us stuck."

"60% of Australian women silence their true feelings in order to avoid being abandoned."

Resources Mentioned

The workbook: https://s3.amazonaws.com/kajabi-storefronts-production/file-uploads/sites/142314/downloads/df562c4-8cac-075f-a48d-c3aa12bcb1_Goodbye_Good_Girl_Club_Workbook_-_August_2025_-_Dr_Michelle_McQuaid_.pdf
Michelle's books:

The Perfectly Imperfect Little Girl: https://www.booktopia.com.au/the-perfectly-imperfect-little-girl-michelle-mcquaid/book/9781763805606.html
The Perfectly Imperfect Women's Journal: https://www.booktopia.com.au/the-perfectly-imperfect-women-s-journal-michelle-mcquaid/book/9781763805620.html?srsltid=AfmBOoqx2OHd6RUeDDPOxrvc-2zDY0s0uA8I5LbpAHCXyEYbsrv8-GJw

Michelle's podcast: The Good Girl Game Changers (with Evie Wright): https://michellemcquaid.substack.com/podcast

Kasey's books:

Goodbye Good Girl, Hello Me: https://www.raisinggirlswholikethemselves.com/goodbye

Raising Girls Who Like Themselves: https://www.raisinggirlswholikethemselves.com/raisinggirls

Bringing Up Boys Who Like Themselves: https://www.raisinggirlswholikethemselves.com/bringingupboys

Use code PODCAST for $10 off

Dr Michelle McQuaid is an honorary fellow at Melbourne University's Centre for Wellbeing Science and the author of six bestselling books. She has conducted extensive research into the good girl phenomenon, uncovering why and how so many of us become good girls and what it costs us to continue letting other people define our worth. Through her science-backed strategies, she has guided thousands of women to reclaim their authentic selves and live as "uniquely you."

If this episode resonated with you, please leave a review and share it with a woman who deserves to hear: You don't need to earn your worth. You just have to remember it.

Episode Transcript

so we saw over and over in the research
women talked about feeling lost
I don't know who I am anymore
I'm resentful that I've you know
shape shifted in all of these ways and I'm exhausted from it
and so we often ask the women like well
what's the alternative to being the good girl
and they came up with being uniquely you
so could I just be uniquely me
or can you be uniquely you
rather than needing to be this good girl everybody expected
and I love that language as a reminder to what you're describing Kasey
and so if we do want to be uniquely us
where do we start
welcome to the Goodbye Good Girl Club
the podcast I'm your host
Kasey Edwards author of Goodbye Good Girl
hello me
if you've spent your life seeking approval from everyone
except yourself putting others needs before your own
and staying silent to keep the peace
this podcast is for you whether you're 35 or 65
the question remains when will you finally be enough
the answer is now you belong here let's begin
so welcome everybody
this is our 5th Goodbye Good Girl Club
and I am so excited to have you all here
um
I'll very shortly introduce the extraordinary Doctor Michelle Mcquade
and I am coming to you from Melbourne
Australia where I am very fortunate to live
on the beautiful lands of the Bunurong
and Wurundjuri Peoples of the Kulin nation
I acknowledge the traditional custodians of these lands
and pay my respects to the elders
past and present and to any First Nations people who are joining us
and I want to thank you each and every one of you for giving yourself
giving each other
and giving Michelle and me this one hour to fill our buckets
and to share space with other smart
supportive and inspiring women
and perhaps challenge some of our beliefs along the way
and as I say every time
joining this club isn't just an act of self love
it is actually an act of rebellion
because women in our society are rarely encouraged to do something
holy for ourselves
one woman who has said goodbye to her own good girl
and guided thousands of women to do the same
through her science backed strategies
is Doctor Michelle McQuaid
so Michelle is an honorary fellow at Melbourne University
Centre for Well Being Science
she is the author of six best selling books
including the perfectly imperfect Women's Journal
and I am quite sure you are all going to want a copy of this
by the end of this session
because it is just so insightful and so useful
we will talk more about this
Michelle has conducted extensive research
into the good girl phenomenon
uncovering why and how so many of us become good girls
and what it costs us to continue to let other people define our worth
and to feel like we have to
earn our love through service and self sacrifice and silence
which we're going to talk more about in a minute
Michelle's research also answers a question
that you might have asked yourself
if we don't want to be good girls anymore
when we have been raised to be like that our whole lives
then who are we and how do we become that
so let's find out please join me in welcoming Michelle McQuaid
good evening good morning
wherever you are in the world
hello everybody
Kasey such a pleasure to be with you
thank you Michelle
I really appreciate your time
and I absolutely loved this journal and highly recommend it
it is packed with just so many wonderful science backed strategies
and we'll be talking about some of those tonight
so Michelle and I will talk for about 30 minutes
then Michelle if you don't mind
I would love for you to share a little bit of information about
actually your two books that I have here
um and then we will answer the questions
okay Michelle
my first question that I have for you is about your own story
because we can draw courage and wisdom from the stories of other women
and I know from reading your work and
and listening to your podcast that you have your own story of saying
goodbye good girl
hello me
um would you like to share that with us tonight
I would be honoured too so my story started as it does for many of us
way back when I was about 5 years old
and I was at the supermarket with my mum
she was a single mum this is back in the uh mid 70s
so not that common in those days and we didn't have a lot of money
but if there was money left at the end of a supermarket shop
was 40 cents in those days
you got to choose a little golden book
and other people he might remember that
they used to be like a book stand at the end of the checkouts
and I went and I chose this book
you might be able to see it on screen now
I was only 5 I couldn't really read this title that says good little
bad little girl but what I could see were the pictures
and I was kind of interested in this very calm
serene looking girl staring out at us
but I resonated more with all the naughty little girls
you might just be able to see around the edges
and she's broken her mother's vase
and she's pulling her sister's hair
I really understood those poses
and so I grabbed this book and I said to my mother
who liked to think of herself as a feminist
I want this book and she's like
you sure I was like yes
this book so that night she took me home
she tucked my sister and I into our bunk
beds and she read the story
and what we Learned from the story of the good little
bad little girl was that there are good little girls who are neat
quiet and obedient patient and selfless
nice tidy
all those things and they were bad little girls who are messy and loud
and defiant and demanding and selfish
and the moral of the story was
that the good little girl
and the bad little girl were the same little girl
but if we learn to make the good little girl grow taller and taller
and the bad little girl smaller and smaller
then we would be happy and loved
and KC I think this was my first self help book
and I made my poor mother read it night after night
I was like surely if I hear this enough
I will know how to be a good little girl
and so I took those lessons very much to heart
I grew up into a young woman that was busy ticking all the boxes
I thought I should tick and by about my mid 30s I had
you know loving family
very successful career financial security
I was traveling the world for both work and pleasure
it seemed like on paper I had it all
and I wasn't happy that that story did not turn out to be true
I was exhausted I was pretty resentful and I was fed up
and so I went back to school and did my masters and then my PhD
studies
trying to understand what actually helps us to thrive as human beings
and that's really been the key to me
helping to break free of those good girl beliefs
and be the perfectly imperfect woman that I am
I really relate to that that moment when you go
I did everything right yeah right
I did all the things that they said I was supposed to do
and I still don't feel like I'm enough
yeah I think it's very common for many of us and
and I often coach women
and work with women who are in about their mid 30s to late
you know sort of late 40s window where we're all going
is this it are you kidding me
like we did all the things and this is all we've got for it
and where the exhaustion and the resentment
and that feeling that we've kind of lost ourselves
just starts to become an unbearable weight for us
yes I
I felt like
I was trying so hard to climb to the top of someone else's ladder
yeah yeah
I think that's a great description for it
um and so
what we're talking about here
with the little golden book that you were given as a girl
and all those other milestones that you were
the boxes that you were ticking
that were actually other people's boxes
is what you talk about in your book
you use the word grooming
and I was really surprised when I read the word groomed
that you say that girls are actually groomed to be good girls
and it was really shocking when I read it
and it was also it also made me sad
but it also made me relieved in a way that
to think that we're not all just silly
weak women who don't know what we want
and don't know how to stand up for ourselves
we were actually groomed so
my question for you is how do we identify this grooming
whether it happened in our childhood
or maybe it's still happening to us
yeah and I'd say for most of it's an end right
um we live in a system of human beings together and
and those systems are really good at seeding messages
that try to put in place certain behaviours
so that we can benefit from that
and sometimes we benefit collectively
and other times maybe people have got the reins of those messages
and it's helping some while it's hurting others
and so
grooming is really all about that kind of surround sound of messages
and so you know
for me it was a little golden book
but you know
for many of us it might have been that at school
we were rewarded with gold stars for sitting quietly on the mat
or doing our neat work or maybe we were in um
faith groups where we were praised for our self sacrifice
or maybe our families you know
told us how valued we were
how good we were when we were agreeable
or when we silenced ourselves and kept the secrets
or didn't make a fuss or upset the apple cart
and so often from really early on in our lives
we find that girls are receiving these societal expectations
really in all sorts of forms
and actually Doctor Carol um
Gilligan from Harvard University
way back in the 1980s she was
really
the first gender researcher to start to document what was going on
and over and over again
Carol's still doing amazing research now in her 70s
she finds that by the age of 11
most girls have Learned to give up their knowing
she calls it a really our voice in order to be able to fit in
because we start to figure out that
if we keep talking about what doesn't seem to make sense
in all of these things we're being asked to do
that it will be harder for us to have um
relationships with other people
so Carol finds we give up our knowing
and then this often gets reinforced right
so we go to work you know
again I'm sure
any of us that have been in workplaces
will have stories around how we've needed to be the good girl
uh to fit in and to get opportunities
we still see it in the world around us
what shocked me most Kasey
cause again I grew up in the 70s
so I'm in 52 now I really thought this was a thing of my generation
um when we did research last year
what we saw was actually the women who are most experiencing
this pressure to be good girls today
are our youngest women
and that kind of makes sense when I started to think about well
what is the grooming that's going on today
on social media and in other platforms
this message is still really strong that in order to earn love
we need to be good girls yes
we found Chris
and I found that
in our research for raising girls who like themselves
that parents would say you know
by the age of 10
it's like my daughter cares so much about what other people think
and she's so insecure and I don't know where it came from
and then we went back and
and identified all these micro moments that girls experience
their whole lives that
essentially teach them to defer to external measures for their worth
whether it be you know
their parents telling them they're a good girl
their teacher or then we get into
you know diets and weight and the beauty industry
like everything so external
it's just we start to notice it at 10 and 11
right yeah
and we found in our research
if you ask most women you know
where did you first learn to be a good girl
everyone will have a story
not unlike mine right
we all have a memory somebody somewhere
often trying to keep us safe
who perhaps encouraged us to be a good girl
told us this was the way of the world
that we'd be rewarded and loved if we did these things
and our young
fertile little brains at that stage really grab onto that
and then we get this reinforcement of the message over and over again
and really stuck with me reading Carol Gilligan's research around that
we give up our knowing we give up our knowing
we stop trusting ourselves
we start doubting ourselves
I think for many of us climbing out of that hole is a lifetime's work
for me it was a real reframing for me
that when I realized that I needed to create a new Kasey
I didn't need to create a new Kasey
I just needed to find the one that was there before the grooming
yeah you just needed to like dust her off and let her know hey
perfectly fine the way that you were
let's just do more of that
and not worry so much about all of those voices around us
what's hard of course
is that our brains are wired to be social creatures
and we yearn to belong and to be part of things
and again we sort of found in our research
the women we talked to
started to differentiate between what they were calling junk food love
a bit like a sugar hit that only lasts for about 30 minutes
and then leaves you craving more
and so this kind of fitting in
I'm doing these things to please others
to earn their love
but I have to keep doing it over and over and over cause it wears off
versus a more nutritious love was what we ended up calling it
which was like eating your vegetables instead of the sugar right
it didn't always taste so good at first
but over time you got a taste for it
and you started to notice how much healthier you felt on the inside
because you are actually honouring who you were
and I love Doctor Daniel Seigel
when we were interviewing him on the podcast
really differentiated and encouraged us to ask
what is the difference between choosing to fit in
and choosing to belong um
and today we were sharing some stuff with our list around
you know are you simply needed or are you chosen to be loved
and so I think these are important distinctions for us to think about
hmm what am I doing and why
and coming back to that idea of belonging
and this is what we talk to kids about in
in friendship you know
you can only be friends with another
with two people who are being their authentic selves right
if people are trying to fit in whatever relationship you form
it's not friendship right
so when we
and I did that myself for years
I tried so hard to fit in
to make friends but every time I changed myself
I actually gave up the opportunity of friendship
because you have to be your authentic self
yeah to find this
where do we start ha ha ha ha
um so this was what fascinated me as a researcher
um and we really saw kind of two sides to this coin
one was understanding what are these good girl behaviours
and so we really found that there were three things
the women consistently described
uh one was trying to perform perfectly
to do it all well to over function
to over prepare to make sure nobody could ever see the cracks
um the second was really pleasing others to put ourselves last
to make sure we're in that caregiving role
making sure everybody's looked after before we are
which makes it really hard for us to set healthy boundaries
and the third was silencing ourselves
in order that we didn't make other people uncomfortable
we didn't rock the boat we kept everything OK
and so this was very common
and we can think about this as a continuum
and let's say
those good girl behaviours are at one end of that continuum
at the other end of the continuum
what we found the women said
the way they were breaking free from those things was
rather than trying to perform perfectly
they were reaching for self compassion
they were remembering we're all perfectly imperfect
that nature wired us that way
so we could learn and grow and adapt
as the world around us and within us keeps changing
so rather than using that inner critic to beat myself up
and tell myself how terrible I am all the time
I could instead be that wise and kind friend to myself
like I would be to anybody else
the pleasing others one
the antidote to that really turned out to be around secure attachment
and so our um
our club members tonight might have heard of secure attachment
in terms of how your family raised you
maybe even your romantic relationship
but in this case it was secure attachment to self
do I know that I will show up for myself
I will advocate for myself
I'll ask for help when I need it
I'll set healthy boundaries
and that I will not abandon myself in order to please others
and then our third
around the silencing ourselves versus the speaking up
was really around self leadership
do I trust that I am wired with curiosity and creativity
compassion and courage all the things
we are at our best when our brain is working nice and clearly
and do I choose to show up in that energy
rather than letting myself get pulled in too many other directions
by fear
and doubt and uncertainty that can cloud who I really wanna be
and how I wanna say things I'm really interested in
the idea of silencing ourselves because when we talk about good girls
we've talked a lot in our club about perfectionism
and about people pleasing
but for me it's it's quite um
painful to think about the way that I myself and
and women around me silence ourselves
because we're fearful of what will happen if we speak truth yeah
and so can you share a strategy that um
we could use if we actually are struggling with that idea of
of feeling we need to be silent
yeah absolutely
so this is one of my favourites
it's called um the U turn so you can think about y U O U U remember
we're trying to be uniquely you
and so this is the U turn
that we're turning back towards our unique selves
it's got three very simple steps and if you want to
you can try them along with me
so the first step is to see when we're feeling pressured to be good
so maybe take a moment
think about what's been going on this week already for you
where perhaps
can you see
that there's been a bit of pressure for you to be the good girl
rather than perhaps the uniquely you you wanna be
and with no judgement just curiosity
maybe just notice perhaps where that pressure is coming from
our second step is to soothe
so you can do this just by placing one hand over your heart
one hand on your belly and just taking three nice slow
deep breaths here
so take a nice deep breath in and a nice deep breath out
and a nice deep breath in
and a nice deep breath out
and as you take that last nice deep breath in
get you to take our third and final step
which is to settle on what matters most to you right now
not everybody else not what's expected of you
not what you should do not what you have to do
but what matters most to you right now
and I always think KC
I've just kind of got to trust my inner wisdom
like often that answer will pop up quite quickly in my head
and then I'll discount it and doubt it and go no
I can't do that and it's like actually
our bodies always know what is the right answer to that question
if we can just get a little quiet and still and then trust ourselves
back ourselves show up for ourselves
and the more we practice doing that
the stronger that voice becomes
and I think guys I always just say with this
this is a skill so like any skill
we have to practice it ha ha ha
in order to keep getting better at it
so at first if it feels a little awkward
just know even if you can see it
and you can start to soothe your body as you notice it
that is great progress and over time
you'll start to feel more comfortable in the settling
of choosing what matters most to you
right now now Kasey
I tend to look for the win win on that right
I try not to just choose things for me
but things that will be good for others as well
but what I know is that it can't always be at my cost
in those things that are being asked of me
so yeah
so we found 60% of Australian women in the survey that we did said yep
I often silence my true feelings in order to avoid being abandoned
that was the real piece right
it was this fear that I'm gonna be abandoned
you won't be happy with me
you'll be angry with me you won't love or like me anymore
and then where am I gonna be on the other side of that
and so what we found was often the women would say
you know I have to be the peacemaker
it's my job to be accommodating
um I should never upset people
I need to stay quiet um
there was one woman in our research
she shared that she kept the secrets of men who abused her
because good girls don't make a scene
I stayed in harmful relationships
because good girls don't cause a fuss
and I lost myself completely trying to be good enough
and I don't know that there's any statistic I could provide
that is more compelling than that
we really saw the women over and over talking about the cost
was they were invisible they felt internally conflicted
and that they were living with this persistent sense of emptiness
that they were not the person they wanted to be
and some of them talking about turning to alcohol
food other sources to numb that pain
staying in diminishing jobs or relationships
just being unable to ask for what they actually needed
before we continue I wanna tell you about something
that might help you on your own journey
if today's conversation is resonating with you
you might want to check out my book
Goodbye Good Girl hello me
it's my personal story
of recognizing and challenging the beliefs that kept me
seeking everyone else's approval
instead of trusting myself
think of it as a roadmap to the person you were always meant to be
and if you're a parent grandparent
carer or teacher
who wants to protect your children from inheriting
these damaging beliefs I've also written
Raising Girls Who Like Themselves
and Bringing Up Boys Who Like Themselves
both best sellers
that show you how to raise kids who value themselves
from the inside out
you can find all these books at kaseyedwards.com
and if you use the code podcast at checkout
you'll get $10 off your order
absolutely everything
we hope and dream for ourselves and for our children in our lives
become easier when we like ourselves
now back to our conversation
for me the cost of silence was shame
yeah that's what I felt
and then I came to the conclusion that shame festers in the dark right
shame festers in silence absolutely
yeah and it isolates us right
so much of that shame you know
that's designed around silence is to cut us off from each other
and I think we saw incredibly in that moment of the Me Too movement
when the silence was suddenly broken worldwide
and women felt safe enough to come forward
and be seen in their stories
um it was like the dam kind of
you know breaking in that moment
for all the silence that had been held by women for so long
I wanna mention a quote that I read from you today actually and
and I've been thinking about it all day
which relates to this idea
this fear of being abandoned
of not being loved you wrote in your email to your community
always needed rarely chosen
and for me
it just summed up the good girl experience that when we are good girls
when we do sacrifice ourselves
when we are meeting everybody else's needs
we feel loved because everyone needs us
yeah but yet when it comes down to it
do they choose us yeah
and I think this is so hard for many of us
right because it feels like
it would be better to be needed than never chosen at all
like will we settle
for needed
is that enough to just be needed even if it means we're never chosen
and I think for many of us growing up
the initial answer is yes
I'll settle for needed needed is better than alone
needed feels better than not wanted
needed feels better than having to face into the fact that
maybe somebody doesn't love me the way that I want to be loved
but the challenge is it keeps us stuck right
it keeps us stuck in relationships that aren't equal
that aren't respectful that aren't mutual
and that we then teach people that that is okay to treat us that way
rather than actually choosing us
and I think for me Kasey
the big piece of learning
cause I I settled for needed for most of my life
the big piece that I was learning was that while everybody needed me
they didn't
they knew that I didn't trust myself enough to choose to be chosen
to want something more for myself
and so if I wasn't gonna choose myself
then why should they choose me either
and it wasn't until I started going
you know what nice to be needed
but I wanna be chosen I deserve to be chosen
and if that means that there are fewer people in my life
but the people that are there
I know have chosen me in all my imperfection
sometimes my crabiness and crankiness and difficulty and too muchness
enough but they will still love me even in all of those states
well I would rather a handful of those people
than a room full of the people that need me
and what was interesting is definitely
there was a period of wilderness of making that transition
but several years on I look around now and I go
I have a life of such beautiful people who choose me and don't need me
and that's just such a gift every day
so again
I know it's a leap of faith
I would encourage it's a leap of faith worth taking
and I think for many of us Kasey
life gets to a point we actually don't have any other choice
but to try to make that leap
because it's exhausting and we're full of resentment for where we are
mm hmm and it's a
a quantity sorry
a quality over quantity thing
isn't it definitely yeah
that's also I think also perspective as well
cause I remember in with my own family and I was
I was needed that was my identity
and it was so important for all of them to need me
and I was so focused on the people who wouldn't choose me
I actually didn't even see the people in my family who did choose me
and it wasn't until I was prepared to let go of the non choosers
and invest in the choosers
that I really started to feel love for me in
in my family relationships
yeah yeah
I think many of us will be nodding our heads listening to that
that it's okay for everyone not to love us
and okay for everyone not to like us
I think that part of that we come to is
we have to actually like and love ourselves
and what got very hard for me was I was needed plenty
but I didn't actually like who I was becoming
and I was showing myself no self love or self care
because I was so busy being needed by everybody else
and I wanted a different relationship with myself
and as I learnt to trust myself and show up for myself
then I started to be chosen more by the people that I wanted to be
and I was okay the people that didn't choose me
I was actually like rejection is Protection here
Michelle keep going
yep that's let's repeat after Michelle
rejection is Protection rejection is Protection
keep going forward you'll be grateful later
and rejection doesn't kill us right
no it doesn't
and I think sometimes it's just us figuring out look
these are not my people or maybe these are not my people right now
or actually this is pushing me out of that nest to be more open
to go out in the world and find where my kind of people are
um again
we are all just we're why to be inately lovable
our people are out there somewhere if we just trust ourselves
and back ourselves enough to go find those people
without pretending that we're something that we're not
yeah and get back to that knowing yeah
we're trained to to forget and abandon yeah
yeah yeah
so I wanna read um
a line from your book wonderful book that um
it actually made me cry when I read it
um I cried for you
but I also cried for me um
because I could relate to it so strongly
it you read
you wrote
no matter how hard I tried
it was never enough I was never enough
this is not how the story was meant to end
now a lot of our stories started the same way
as we've already talked about
but that's not how any of our stories are meant to end
are they so
if there are some people here tonight
who are feeling like they're never enough
what is one thing they can do when they wake up tomorrow
to start writing the next chapter of their story
yeah so when I wake up each morning
just before my feet touch the floor
so in that transition from kind of lying down to getting up
but before my feet touch the floor
I like to ask myself
and I have it on the wall on a little plaque near my bed to remind me
on whose terms and for whose benefit
am I living my wild and precious life
and I love these kind of two questions right
on whose terms and for whose benefit
because it just reminds me each day
before the feet touch the floor
and I start getting into all the business
that I have the power to choose
I get the freedom to choose no matter what's going on in my world
what difficulties or limits I'm facing
what opportunities might be in front of me that day
I get to choose on whose terms and for whose benefit
am I living this wild and precious life
and I wanna be clear here that it really
the answer is just mine it's just on my terms and for my benefit today
because again we're wired to be social creatures
we're meant to be in community and connection with each other
and there are definitely
some days where it doesn't feel as much on my terms
or for my benefit as I want
I have two sons so
you know we get what that's like
I have a business with people that rely on me and clients that need me
and all sorts of things going on
but what it can't be day after day after day
the answer to those questions cannot be
it's on somebody else's terms and it's at my cost
because that's when it becomes unsustainable
I can maybe go few days in that direction
but it has to be some balance coming back in
and I like these questions
cause it helps me to keep looking for where is that grooming going on
and stories telling me about how I meant to behave
and what I meant to be doing
this is what I would choose to be doing
with this wild and precious life
it is such a wonderful quote
it is in the workbook everybody screen grab that quote
pop it on your phone print it out
put it next to your bed and it's such like you say
it's a really grounding question
about how you're going to go through your day
on whose terms and for whose benefit
also in the workbook is Michelle's quiz
which will her good girl quiz
there is a link to that
and that will give you an understanding of the depths and breaths
of your good girl and also your um
uniquely you beliefs is that correct Michelle
that's right yep
so um yeah
I encourage all of you to um
do that quiz because what
it's much easier to solve a problem if you fully understand it right
if we really start to think about
what is it that you believe about you
that isn't working for you anymore
what particular good girl beliefs
are the things that you wanna challenge
because there making you live a life that's not on your terms
and that isn't always for your benefit
I think Kasey the other thing you can see in the quiz is
and where are your strengths
yep so you'll see sort of where's the bit that's hard right now
but also where's the bits that I'm nailing
and I think those are just important
just as important for us to know go okay
I could keep building on those bits
and I can take what I'm learning from that
and maybe use it over here
for the bit that's still a bit of a work in progress
especially um
in that rocky transition from the good girl to the uniquely you
it's really important to remember
to define yourself on what you can do
what you have nailed and what you still
rather than on what you haven't achieved yet
or what you're still working on right
yes definitely playing to our strengths
so one last question before um
we ask you to talk about your books
Michelle if you could go back and whisper something into the ear
of your 20 year old self what would it be
it would be to tell her that she is perfectly imperfect
just like everybody else ha ha
and that she's got this right
I think so often we think it's just us
it doesn't have it all figured out and that isn't getting it all right
and we missed the um fact that again
nature wired us all to be perfectly imperfect
so that we could learn and grow and adapt as the world around us
and within each of us keeps changing
and that that is what we are each made to do
so it's really hard actually
to fail at that
unless we choose to try to pretend that we are perfect
in which case we shut down all the learning opportunities
that are right in front of us
I also like the beat just like everybody else right
exactly just like everybody else
I'm in very good company here
one of my main motivations for this club is like
we are all on this journey
you know you
there's no magic switch that you can flick and suddenly
you're not a good girl anymore
and you've undone your whole childhood of all that grooming
but we're all on this journey together of um
getting back in touch with our
knowing and reclaiming our authentic selves
yeah absolutely
so Michelle
please um
share with everyone what's inside this book and why they all need it
well so there's actually two books
one
I went and I rewrote that little golden book as an adult story book
it does have a few naughty words in there
um but we really did it as a way to bring together all the research
we Learned from the women
and to give us the book that we probably wish we'd had as kids
and then to make it practical
cause I love the practical and what can you do with all of this
we created the Women's Journal to go along
so you can get them separately um
on Amazon or your favourite book place
um but they're often quite good together
one will give you a good giggle and a laugh
and the other is full of practical um
evidence based tools that you can use to build those skills of self
compassion of secure attachment of self leadership
and then throughout
you'll find little bits of my story sprinkled in there
and my colleague Evie Wright
we had so much success with that Kasey
that we had lots of people saying
could you do a children's version without the swear words please
so we can give them to little kids
so we are at the moment
just launching the children's version of the story book
with no swear words we had lots of parents asking us hey
can you help us have conversations with our girls about this
given that by the age of 11
still so many of us as girls are learning to give up our knowing
so those are the books
you have a podcast
I'm just going to bring up the questions that people have asked
while I do that
would you like to share about your podcast in case anyone is
yes so I've popped in the chat a link to our website
The Good Girl Game changers.com
but you'll also find our podcast there
and so we interview researchers all over the world
and share lots of practical tools
cheat sheets that you can get for different somatic practices
my collaborator is a wonderful woman called Evie Wright
who is in a previous life a paramedic and now a yoga teacher
so while I bring all the brain science
Evie brings all the beautiful somatic practices
and so lots and lots of free resources there
and podcast with wonderful people
you can also get the podcast
it's called The Good Girl
Game Changers
on apple or Spotify or your favourite platform to listen on
and it's great I listen to it
we've had you on it we've been on it in fact
yes yeah
that's my favourite episode
yeah yeah
good well said
okay so here's some questions
um
oh we've
we've touched on this but I would like to drill down a little bit more
cause it's such a heartfelt question
and I think a lot of people struggle with this
I'm struggling with letting go of people pleasing
because I'm worried that it's better to be loved
for serving other people than not be loved at all
yeah and again
the bigger half of me was that conversation
actually
on the podcast that we've just mentioned with Doctor Daniel Seigel
who's one of the world's leading researchers on attachment theory
and Dan really pointed out that difference between fitting in
and belonging um
and just as we were talking about earlier
being needed and being chosen
so I think sometimes we confuse these things
and certainly in my experience when I'm in people pleasing mode
I might be needed I might be fitted in
fitting in but I'm not really loved because it's a conditional thing
and I'm not really chosen again cause it's a conditional thing
and so there's no shame in that
sometimes for where we are right now in this world
bit of fitting in and being needed is enough for where we are
in my experience most of us come to a point if not by our own choice
that life finally gets us there
this is exhausting
I'm starting to feel resentful that other people don't show up for me
in the way I show up for them
and we have to start to take that leap of faith that says
I deserve more than this I deserve to be chosen
I deserve to be loved
and making that transition starts with you choosing you
and you loving you enough to want more for yourself
so again lots of tools in that journal book to help do that work
I'm a big fan of Internal Family Systems
IFS has become more popular the last few years on uh
things like Glen and Doyle's podcast
we can do hard things and that
and so again a lot in that book around that
but um I found for me personally
that that piece of work was really what made that difference
of learning to love myself enough
to let others choose me
I think the other thing with defining your worth by being needed is
I got a glimpse of this just yesterday
that it's actually a risky strategy
and the glimpse that I got was um
my 11 year old didn't want me to walk her to school
like it sounds so Mana but what if I know and cause she could
she's a big girl and she can go by herself and it's like
yep that's what we've been working towards right
but what that means is I wasn't needed yesterday morning
and that's just the beginning of not being needed by my children right
um and so
if I have defined my whole identity on being needed by my children
then I'm gonna be in trouble in a few years time
yeah definitely
and I think it can be also that um
you know what if people stop needing us
and also well
it's exhausting right to only ever be
it's so conditional that we have to again
like that sugar hit
the junk food love the women described in our studies
you gotta keep showing up and proving yourself again and again
and again and again um
and yeah I've
I have an adult um
boy who's 20 and definitely as it probably about 14
I think for him um
through to the last few years
that definitely we went through that transition in our relationship
that he no longer needed me
didn't even really want me very much
but in the end we've come out the other side where he has chosen me
and he lives by himself with his girlfriend now and that
and still makes time for me each week
and I'm like okay
I am chosen here but I'm also okay that if he doesn't choose me
then that's just not where we are at this moment in time
and yes I'll be sad and I'll miss him
but I don't want him here because he feels I need him to be here
I want us in each other's lives because we've chosen each other
okay the next question is
this is a very good one
how can we tell the difference between genuine kindness
and people pleasing behaviour
oh um
in my experience there's a difference in intention and energy
and how you feel after the fact
so the intention part is
am I doing this because I genuinely want to give to you
is it coming from a place of love
or am I doing this because I'm scared that if I don't do it
you won't think well of me
so intention is it love based or is it fee based
is always a good starting place for me to know which one am I in
um then I think the energy of it right when I'm doing the thing
does it feel like it's open hearted
and it's renewing and energizing for me
or am I feeling like it's draining and exhausting
and I'm feeling quite resentful about the energy in it
so when I'm in the thing
does it feel like I'm aligned and in a healthy place in this act
or does it feel like I've gone against myself in some way
and again our bodies pretty clear about giving us those messages
if we're tuning in and listening
and then the after the fact
do I feel like oh wow
that was such a privilege and pleasure to get to do that for somebody
or am I feeling like right
that's one to me they owe me
in which case it wasn't really an act of kindness
so I think intention energy
how you feel when you walk away from it
are all good ways to start to figure out when am I people pleasing
and when am I genuinely being kind
and I think that the people pleasing grooming is so strong
that sometimes we don't know until the end yes
yes and that's why I kind of have the 3 K's
because sometimes I can think it's love and I can feel in the middle
it's really energizing and good
but afterwards you know
you kind of got that like sour taste in your mouth
a slightly sick feeling in your tummy
it's like yeah
OK that wasn't what I thought it was
yeah I
you're right I mean
kindness feels good the whole way through
doesn't it it really does
and I think that that's really important
that when we can get caught up in
you know like only choosing ourselves
like you said but it's so important for us to
to be kind and to give and to connect with our community and
and that's something that really came out particularly um
in our research for boys
that boys actually get to an age where they stop
they can stop doing things for other people
like even in the house
and we spoke to boys who had never seen their father do anything
for anyone other than himself
and this is an absolute disaster for mental health right
so we do
we do need to to give and be kind and to share and to help
but yeah
we need to check in with our bodies and make sure that it's the right
you're aligned right
it feels right I always think like
my body's pretty good at telling me when I'm aligned
and when I'm out of alignment
the only question is whether I'll listen to it
and whether I'll do anything about it
and learn that lesson for next time
and a shift for me is when I get to the other side of helping someone
and it doesn't feel good that the shift for me is
I understand that that's on me yes
yes because I was the one who didn't hold my boundary
yeah my resentment
it's not the other person
it's actually me because I could have chosen differently
yeah and which is actually empowering absolutely
I always think
whenever I get my blame and shame finger out at somebody
else that there are three fingers pointing back at me
so what was mine to own in this
cause that's really the only thing I can control and impact
before I go wagging my uh
blame and shame finger around at anybody else
yeah great
great advice I'm just reading a comment from rose here
um isn't that one of life's ironies that we raise strong
independent adults and encourage them to see the world
and then feeling bereft that they're gone
absolutely yes
yep a child raised well is heartbreak for us
you raise them to not need us anymore right
yeah yeah
okay that is all the questions that we have tonight
thank you so much Michelle
I really appreciate your time and
and your wisdom and also sharing your own personal story with us
because we are all on this journey
um and that we can
as I started with
get courage and wisdom from the experiences of other women
thank you so much
and thank you for creating a space where we can all hang out together
thank you for joining the Goodbye Good Girl Club today
if this episode resonated with you
I'd be so grateful if you could leave a review
wherever you listen to podcasts
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women who just like you
deserve so much more than they've been settling for
and please
share this podcast with the women in your life who need to hear these
conversations send it to your sister
your mum your best friend
your colleague
anyone who's been putting everyone else first for far too long
if you want a roadmap to saying goodbye to your own good girl
you can grab a copy of my book
Goodbye Good Girl hello me at kaseyedwards.com
use the code podcast for $10 off this book or my parenting books
raising girls who like themselves
and bringing up boys who like themselves
until next time you don't need to earn your worth
you just have to remember it
this is the goodbye good girl club
I'm Kasey Edwards thank you for being here

#5: Good Girls Are Always Needed, Rarely Chosen with Dr Michelle McQuaid

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