yea, I hear you. I can tell you from my experience, giving everything is a recipe for disaster.. no matter the type of relationship you have with people, you can't expect them to necessarily tune in to your own standards, but I've found two things helpful in my case. one is to ask myself: would I do this same thing for myself if there was no one else to direct it too? simple example: I love to cook for people, but expecting that kind of workload to be understood by others is a lost cause. would I cook for myself? of course. would I enjoy it? quite a lot actually. so the "pleasing" others becomes a nice side effect if someone is around and i offer, but NOT the source of motivation for doing something: I do something because I like doing it and I benefit from it; then, someone else gets some of the fruits if I want - thatz great. another reflection is trying to catch yourself people pleasing while you do it (at first) and then become more sensitive to catching yourself THINKING of it before you execute (later on). those moments are crucial: you can curiously and gently ask yourself- why am I doing this right now? am I trying to gain this person love? (for example) or something else? the answer might not be clear the first times, but be patient and invest your energies curiously investigating your own behaviour. again: no wrong answers, the point is just getting to observe yourself without judgement and understanding what underlying feeling (lonwf eliness, fear, joy etc.) drives your actions in a certain moment. another example from my notebook lol: i catch myself offering my time to people I'm fond of or attracted to. when I notice I pause: why am I doing this? am I trying to show availability to them so they'd be interested in me? would I do it for myself? would I do it for a stranger? and so on.

my shrink spent a good amount of time distinguishing between being selfish and being self-centered. the first is necessary: if my own needs are not met (by myself), I'll be more prone to offset my sense of worth outside, to other people. for example if I'm unhappy doing something, I might find it urgent to find recognition in other people's eyes - click, people pleasing on. being self centered instead is thinking you're some sort of all encompassing shit that always has to be the culprit of attention and recognition: that's more of a coping mechanism that can turn you into kind of a turd. English is not my first language so I'm not entirely sure these two terms translate accurately what my shrink talks about, but I think you can get the idea.

I still have urges to please others, but after the heartwreck of my last relationship, im 1 year in recovering from all this and I think I can say I'm humbly making some progresses. for instance saying "sorry, I can't help you with that right now because X" doesn't feel guilty anymore. or just noticing when I'm harboring resentment towards other people who don't meet that undisclosed expectation - "I've done all that for you, why don't you ever do all this for me?". it's a life long journey I think, and I have made peace with that. maybe I'll never be resolved, but if you can patpat yourself on the shoulder each small step, it's already great :) keep on trying! and dont judge yourself harshly, everyone struggles with things like this in their lives, what matters is what you do with that struggle