Hi there, this is Book of the Day. I'm Chloe Veltman. We've all been there, doing something for a friend, colleague or family member just to be nice when you're really not feeling it. In her new non-fiction book, F approval, you don't need it, Scottish therapist Lizzie Maltz says, you know what, to this way of moving through the world.

In this interview with Peter O'Dowd, host of WBUR's Here and Now,

Malt shares tips and tricks for how to become more intentional

and genuine in responding to others' desires and requests.

My personal favourite, can't help you, because I'm off to the beach.

Yeah. personal favorite. Can't help you, because I'm off to the beach. You come to the New Yorker Radio Hour for conversations that go deeper with people

you really want to hear from, whether it's Bruce Springsteen or Questlove or Olivia Rodriguez,

Liz Cheney, or the godfather of artificial intelligence, Jeffrey Hinton,

or some of my extraordinarily well-informed colleagues at The New Yorker. So join us every week

on the New Yorker Radio Hour, wherever you listen to podcasts. Here's a hypothetical situation

that might sound familiar. Let's say you have a friend who's moving,

and he asks you for help on a Saturday morning when you have plans to do something that you've really been looking forward to. But you don't want to hurt your friend's feelings, so you say, yeah, sure, I can help. Why did you do that? Well, you might be a people pleaser,

and your urge to make people happy could be making you sick. Lizzie Molt is a therapist based in

Scotland. She was a people pleaser. Her upcoming book is called F approval. You don't need it. Lizzie,

welcome. Hi, how are you? I'm doing well. I love the title of

your book because I feel like no matter how this interview goes, it's going to be fine. Who cares

what people think? It always makes me smile the title every time. I'm like, yeah, I just did say that.

Yeah. So look, Lizzie, why do people pleasers say yes when they want to say no?

So why we do it is go back to like when you're a super little kid.

So probably around the one and a half two year old mark, you start learning to eat, say,

at the table with your family.

You know, maybe mom and dad are like, yeah, go pick up the spoon, you know, get the food in

...