Asiana Market: A Lesson in People-Pleasing
Feeling “Good Enough” is Found in Showing Up Authentically
My partner is Korean, and so I have been introduced over time to a lot of businesses and stores that I didn’t know before. One of the major Korean supermarkets nearby is Asiana Market. Having seen them grow and become more successful over the years (shoutout to those of us who knew them before they moved to their current location off of Dobson Road and Southern Avenue), I see a lot of lessons about self-worth and authenticity.
With so many of them out there, it can be hard for a new grocery store to gain enough customers to do well. When I first went to Asiana Market, I was disappointed to see a very small dairy section as I had wanted to do all of my grocery shopping at once. My partner explained to me how dairy isn’t common in a lot of Asian cooking, so they often don’t need to buy a lot of dairy products. That reminded me that a business, or a person, doesn’t have to be everything for everyone.
People-pleasers often struggle with this feeling of wanting to make everyone happy, and so they will adjust themselves constantly to be what every person needs. It leads them to exhaustion, resentment, and often feeling like they are never enough. That is the problem though, we can never be everything for everybody, it is impossible, and stretches us thin when we try.
Asiana Market demonstrates how not trying to be everything for everyone really works. They know that there are plenty of grocery stores that suit the tastes of the wider population in America. Those grocery stores have that handled. What is harder to find is a grocery store that has all of the vegetables, fruits, cuts of meat, sauces, and snacks that a lot of Asian people living here might be craving.
The owners of Asiana Market know exactly what those foods and Asian family staples are because that is their lived experience. That is their authenticity. By being unafraid to show up as themselves as a minority here, they have been able to bring exactly what some people need. They’ve brought a sense of comfort, connection, community, and belonging to people who’ve needed it through food.
Asiana Market offers a felt sense of home for many, and that feeling is priceless to the people that shop there. Leaning into who they are, their authenticity, has resulted in Asiana Market truly succeeding, expanding into a much larger grocery store than they started out as. They even created a small food court filled with other Asian business owners connected to their grocery store, expanding their influence. It seems that they have found success by serving a need they have likely felt themselves: a need for connection in their community, somewhere they feel at home and understood.
This is a lesson all of us need at some point: be the best version of yourself, let yourself be seen in all of your authenticity, and the people who you are perfect for will find you. You will feel more valuable, because you aren’t trying to compete in areas that aren’t you. Instead, you are focusing in on exactly what you have to offer the world and doing it well. When you focus in on your strengths, what you know well, you will feel like you are enough, because you don’t even have to try, and you will be loved and valued, being just perfect for the right people.
