This City Taught Me to Stop People-Pleasing and Start Haggling

I learned how to overcome my need to please while hunting for rugs in Marrakesh.

“You exhibit textbook people-pleaser traits,” Diana decided.

“If you think so,” I said, confirming her point.

“Offering to pay more at a flea market is unheard of,” she reminded me. “Work on that before you graduate and enter the real world.”

“What about ‘Treat others how you want to be treated?’”

“Sometimes you need to be tough with people to get what you want.”

“Like in The Godfather?”

Diana sighed, “That’s all the time we have for this week.”

Ten years after that therapy session, I’m a 32-year-old people pleaser who is constantly shaped by this trait. For example, instead of becoming a journalist speaking truth to power, I mostly tend to write about unique restaurants, hotels, and places where people could enjoy themselves. When a magazine sent me to Marrakesh, I found the ancient city to be unlike anywhere else in the world.

Marrakesh doesn’t have the modernity of Manhattan, the nonchalance of Paris, or the flashing lights of Tokyo, instead it’s one massive and bustling market. For nearly a thousand years, the Old City—the medina—has functioned under a system of haggling in which one must stand their ground and negotiate for everything. In other words, the medina is not a great spot for a lifelong people pleaser. I thought back to that session with Diana and how if I were ever going to get over people-pleasing, then haggling in the medina might be the exposure therapy I needed.

A People Pleaser in Marrakesh

Just outside the medina’s towering walls, La Mamounia (a Fodor’s Finest recipient) was my base of operations. Once the home of the king of Morocco, this former palace was converted into a sprawling, exquisitely manicured hotel that threads the needle between Moroccan tradition, peak luxuries, and the creature comforts of the West, including cocktails, room service, and plush terry robes. The gardens and pool made for an excellent respite from the medina’s cacophony of sounds and stimuli.

The hotel put me in touch with a guide, Hanane Chouquir, who met me that morning and explained the basics: “There are no fixed prices in the medina,” she said. “Teapots, kaftans, spices—all of these must be negotiated.”

From the main square, Jamaa El-Fnaa, we walked past the stands selling piles of almonds, dates, and fruits, into the intricate network of streets. The first layer is built to immediately ensnare tourists: stands selling soccer jerseys, fake Hermés bags, and carved plaster signs into which artisans have etched things like “Julie,” “Harper,” or simply “Marrakesh.” Every seller is beckoning you in, but I steeled myself.

As we passed a spice merchant, I stopped to take a photo of barrels overflowing with colorful heaps of cactus flowers and paprika. The merchant saw me and made his pitch. “You like?” he asked, holding up a small scoop and sack that would hold a pound of paprika. “100 dirham” (about $10), he offered. I was tempted by his seemingly lowball offer. At Whole Foods, you’d pay the same for a tenth as much. Hanane, on the other hand, put her hand on my shoulder and ushered me along.

“Don’t buy spices from barrels out in the sun,” she explained. “These just look pretty. The sun saps all the flavor, and the dust covers them.” I nodded and made a mental note as we kept moving. For a moment, I wondered what she meant by the dust, but it became clear when three men on motorbikes whirred around the corner and zoomed past us, leaving a plume of dusty earth that settled everywhere.

I told her how, back in New York, I was redecorating my apartment and looking for some rugs. She beamed and turned us down a new alleyway toward a section called Ben Youssef—named for the mosque and school nearby. There, a few merchants sold western-inspired fashions and bric-a-brac. “There are lots of wonderful artists in the medina,” explained Hanane. “Streets full of metalworkers, painters, rug weavers—all kinds of things.”

When my tour with Hanane ended, she pointed me to a rug seller. I stepped through the building’s large wooden doors and found rolls upon rolls of rugs set around a large marble floor. A man guided me to a chair, put a cup of mint tea in my hand, and we chatted about the size, color, and texture of the rug I was interested in. As we were talking, another staff member began spreading various rugs out on top of one another on the marble floor. As I told the man I was looking for something roughly 5 x 3’ feet, not white, and patterned, the other man was unfurling rug after rug to my specifications: deep blues, crisscross patterns, thick piles with soft yarns.

One rolled out behind the man that I thought would perfectly fit in my apartment. It was a deep red color with markings the merchant explained were traditional Berber symbols—the original inhabitants of Marrakesh. Having found the rug, I mentally prepared myself for battle.

“How much for this one?” I asked.

“An excellent choice, a beautiful rug,” he agreed.

“How much is it, though?”

“Only about 6,000 dirham.” In USD, that is roughly $1,600.

“Hmm, I was only looking to spend about 2,000,” I said, hoping to end somewhere at 3,000. Go big or go home, I thought to myself

He twisted and shifted his weight between his feet, staring at the rug. It rested atop a stack of 15 others, his colleague unfurled without my asking. While he let me squirm, I opened the door to intrusive thoughts like, if I don’t buy this, are they going to make me help put these back?

“Could you come up to 4,000?” he replied.

“I really couldn’t do more than two.” I lied, but was keen to stick to that number.

“I am a businessman,” he faux pleaded. “These are very high quality.” He flipped the rug over to show another side that could be displayed as the finished one with a flatter weave.

“I completely agree they’re high quality,” I said, proud of myself for sticking to my initial offer. “I just can’t pay more than 2,000.”

We were silent for a moment, and I dealt what I thought would be the final blow to get them to come to the table.

“Thanks anyway, though,” I sputtered, standing up to fake leaving.

The man shrugged and motioned to his aide, and they started to divert their attention back to other potential customers looking back in the shop. It wasn’t until my fake leave became a real one on the street that I realized there were levels at which they weren’t going to budge. In a market that is more than 900 years old, they weren’t about to be duped by the ole’ walk-out, I guessed.

Back at La Mamounia, I drifted between the pool and snacking on dates while devising new strategies with the sellers. They offered varying deals. Some were keen to move product, agreeing to my wildly lowballed offers so quickly that it almost made me question if the rug was laced with moths. Others used the terrain to their advantage. Over time, it became clear that the sellers hanging their wares in the open in the sunlight weren’t selling as high-quality of products as those with large marble-floored rooms through a corridor. Once inside those corridors, though, the salesman would stand at the entry point to discourage leaving without a deal struck.

Harder still, if I lowballed someone and they accepted, I couldn’t say, “Actually, I don’t want it at all, I’m just practicing my arguing.” I’m a people pleaser, but I have limits. I wanted the rugs for the apartment, but what I wanted more was to hone my fortitude for debate. By the end of my second day, I had wandered about half of the old city and acquired four rugs—none of which were to my liking for the apartment, but I told myself I would give as gifts to friends.

After checking out of La Mamounia, I doubled down on my efforts. I embedded myself deep in the medina at a magical hideaway of a riad called Dar Darma. A seemingly normal door on a quiet, plain street opened to an incredible mansion that smelled like orange flower, crafted in stone, and with its own small rooftop pool. From Dar Darma, I had direct access to the side of the medina Hanane had initially brought me to—one full of artisans, makers, and rug weavers.

Meandering through the back corridors of the medina on my last day, I found the rug I’d been looking for: a mix of weaves that were plush in some places, flat in the center, with a traditional Moroccan pattern on it. It was one that I’d spotted while another couple from the U.K. was having rugs unfurled and stacked in front of them on the floor, and I caught it from the corner of my eye, passing from the street. When the British couple moved along, I walked in and asked about it.

“How much for this one?” I asked.

“A beautiful rug. It’s 6,000 dirham.”

I suggested 2,500. He countered with 4,500. I told him it was really all I had left in dirhams before leaving in the morning. He showed me the old woman in the back, hand-looming each rug to demonstrate the craftsmanship and skill. We went back and forth for a bit before I noticed the stack of kilim-weave pillowcases stacked in the doorway. In the end, we came to 3,000, with a few of the pillowcases thrown in to sweeten the deal—50% off the top, with pillowcases—I consider that a successful enough bargain.

After a week of navigating the tightly woven streets of the medina, I can’t say for sure if my people-pleasing ways are completely behind me. When I sat down in my seat on the flight back to New York, three rolled-up rugs were above me in the overhead, four below me in a checked trunk. A flight attendant asked me if I’d mind switching seats to another row, next to a screaming baby, to accommodate the overflow from first class. I managed to eke out, “I’m sorry, no.” From my first day in Marrakesh to my successful bargain the medina, I was finally ready to put my newfound stubbornness to use in everyday life.