Mr. Nice Guy

"You're way too nice," is something Reid Busselle hears all the time, but it is not always meant as a compliment.

People say this to him after borrowing his work tools on the construction site and then returning them damaged — or not returning them at all. His wife told him he was "too nice" whenever he refused to argue with her. And he tells himself the same thing when he thinks about advancing at work to become a foreman. He could never imagine telling other people what to do, though he has spent a lifetime gaining the skills and experience to do it. So he continues working as a sheetrock and metal framer, which is taking a toll on his 48-year-old body.

"If you're too nice, you get a lot of people who take advantage of you," says Busselle, who lives in Puyallup. "To avoid conflict, I'd even refuse to take something I bought back to a store if it was the wrong size or if it was defective."

The extremely nice often find themselves stuck in middle-management jobs, unfulfilling relationships and no idea why their niceness isn't reciprocated as they think it should be. Though there are equal numbers of "overly nice" men and women, it is men especially who find themselves frustrated by their compulsive niceness and stuck because of it.

Busselle has spent a great deal of energy trying to make sure things go smoothly, yet the paradox is that this very behavior actually creates turbulence in his life.

An overly nice guy might insist on paying for absolutely everything, apologize incessantly, compliment people with abandon and minimize his own accomplishments while making sure everybody else feels worthwhile.

Nice guys hope that by doing these things, they will change others' behavior. But real life is never so simple.

"It's confusing to people," says Timothy Keller, a 23-year-old music major at the University of Washington, who picked up a copy of a friend's book called "Anxious to Please" and immediately identified with the term "chronically nice."

He was constantly doing nice things for women he wanted to date, and trying to make sure they were happy with questions like: "Do you want another beer? A glass of water? Are you hungry? Can I drive you somewhere?"

"I actually think it came across as kind of creepy," says Keller.

People he met wondered why he had so much time to do so many things for them. And he noticed the nice strategy didn't help him get work, either. In an important job interview, he remembers trying hard to be everything the boss wanted. This also backfired.

Keller now realizes his acquiescent behavior made him seem less desirable and less real. "I'm sure the boss picked up on that and thought: That's bull!" he says.

A self-destructive pattern

"Nice guys are fundamentally dishonest," says Dr. Robert Glover, a licensed marriage and family therapist in Bellevue, and author of "No More Mr. Nice Guy!" one of two books on the subject by local authors. The nice guy says what other people want to hear and hides their mistakes to avoid conflict.

Glover has worked for years counseling men whose need to please has interfered with their work and relationships. These men generally fear being the brutish jerk that people dislike. By being extremely nice, they believe they're different and therefore better than the typical guy.

Men are also more reluctant than women to discuss the issue or identify it as a problem because of societal conditioning. And it's a problem that has grown over the past few decades, says Glover, even though it's rarely discussed openly.

A "covert contract" guides most chronically nice behavior, says Glover. It is the hope that niceness will beget niceness, and they will be rewarded and liked by doing things for others, and never have to demand anything for themselves.

But asking for what you want out of any kind of relationship is part of what makes it a healthy one, he says. The extremely nice never seem to get what they want and beneath all the strained smiles, a passive-aggressive rage can be slowly seething.

"In any kind of relationship they want to end, these men hope for what I call the Greyhound Divorce," says Glover, "They hope their partner will just get hit by a Greyhound bus or maybe get cancer rather than taking action to change something."

They start to resent the other person for not fulfilling all their needs, but can't address it because it just wouldn't seem nice.

He also mentions the other way that nice guys decide to ditch a relationship. Rather than telling another person what they need or what isn't working, they opt for the "break-up by stripper" method. This involves doing destructive things until the partner calls it off out of frustration.

Gaining perspective on behavior

Unlike a clinical diagnosis of something like generalized anxiety disorder, which occurs in only 5 percent of the population, and involves pronounced and distressing worry that makes it difficult to function, "nice guys" can function normally in daily life.

It's just that they aren't truly happy. The compulsive desire to be nice to everyone is an overwhelming and exhausting task.

"I wanted to be liked by everyone, even grocery store clerks," says Craig English, co-author with James Rapson of the new book, "Anxious to Please."

English was the guy who always stayed late at the office, usually until 11 p.m., feeling unappreciated but hoping his efforts at work would be noticed.

Someday.

He was the guy who for years could not write an e-mail without saying "thank you" and complimenting the recipient at least once.

By simply being aware of his feelings, he was able to identify how it felt to be "nice" versus genuinely kind. He started to stand up for himself at work and noticed that when he was falling all over himself to appear nice, he was often just trying to get a certain reaction.

"A great question is to ask yourself is: Would it have been just as easy not to have done the nice thing? If so, you have to ask yourself if you are trying to get someone to like you," says English.

The hardest part of changing behavior requires a nice guy to confront a core belief that he is not OK just as he is — without the $50 flower arrangement, or the extravagant meal on the first date or those extra hours at the office on weekends.

Rapson and others counsel men on how to ask for what they want and accept that in any relationship they also have needs. They help men focus on the reality of a situation and allow them to give up the illusion of control. Soon nice guys are more focused on what is really happening than the fantasy of what could happen.

Glover even suggests practicing more of the "nice" behavior as an experiment, just to see how it feels to go completely overboard. After spending an entire weekend overly focused on everyone else's needs, it quickly becomes apparent how annoying such servile behavior can be.

The key is reconnecting with other men, getting physically strong and healthy, finding healthy male role models who can share their feelings and take risks, and re-examining the relationship with their fathers, which is often lacking in some way, Glover says.

For Keller, the first step toward change was paying attention to his own behavior. He noticed whenever he worried about what people thought of him, he'd lapse into his pleasing pattern. His shoulders would tense and his stomach would become upset.

Once aware, he was able to change his behavior, and now says he's much happier. He has found himself developing real relationships with a variety of people he never would have gotten to know in the past.

"I used to try to 'nice' my way into people's affections," he says. "Now I've been able to substitute doing nice things for actually fostering an emotional connection."

Diana Wurn is a frequent contributor to The Seattle Times; dianawurn@hotmail.com.