[sergiotapia]

>that I generally like pleasing people

Wrong move buddy - this is 100% the cause of all the issues you're facing. People smell that, they kind of dislike you. BAD people smell that, they exploit your weakness to the max. There is no upside.

Work on fixing this immediately.

[yesenadam]

Um. Not sociopathic enough, that's your diagnosis? No room for decent human beings in business? It's bad to like pleasing people?! ...

Hopefully this is one of those times I find a comment horrifying/depressing but they didn't really mean what I thought they meant.

[frustratedmngr]

The problem is... how do I actually fix this? I have considered therapy before, however, I find it particularly hard to pick a given therapist/approach. Do you have any recommendation?

[brokenmachine]

Just accept that you don't need to be friends with everybody. Some people you just will not get along with. Whether it's you or them that's responsible is not really important.

I always try to be nice at the start, but if it goes south I just try to avoid that person. It has worked for me but YMMV.

[brokenmachine]

Also something I read recently and agree with is this:

You do NOT have to be nice to people who are mean to you.