Boundaries | Practices that support setting and maintaining them ♡
Boundaries are tricky! If they were easy or if there was a quick fix, it wouldn’t be such a common challenge to implement and maintain them! I feel that much of the challenge of upholding our boundaries is built out of the capitalist society we live within, where hyper-productivity is praised and exhaustion is still seen as a status symbol. In other words, if you have a hard time with boundaries, you are not alone! I am however hopeful, that this blog will prove to be supportive for you: to create sustainable change, and begin implementing boundaries with ease!
But first, know that there is no RIGHT way to set boundaries! Like many things, I believe that when you give yourself the time and space to get clear on what matters to you most, on what you need to feel your best, that implementing and sticking to boundaries start to feel way way way more easeful!
As always, I do not have a magic 5 step plan that will overnight support you to implement boundaries with ease! Instead, I provide some suggestions below for ways to give yourself time and space, to increase your awareness of how things are unfolding right now, and with this awareness, build confidence to take intentional action moving forward!
1. CREATE AWARENESS
Any time you are trying to make a change in your life, getting a clear picture of what things look like right now is super helpful. I would highly encourage you to approach this task with both curiosity and kindness.
What does this look like in practice? You could ask yourself:
Where are my own needs on my priority list?
When do I tend to prioritize others?
What does it look like when I am choosing? Do I make the choice consciously, or is it a knee-jerk reaction to prioritize others?
Perhaps you are already painfully aware of how you prioritize others over yourself. For some, this might be with work, a tendency toward working unpaid overtime. For others, it might be more in your personal life, maybe a family dinner you. But for many, the pervasive feeling is that you're supposed to, or if you don't there will be consequences. For many, even the thought of not doing those things can provoke feelings of guilt and fear!
What I have noticed, is that this guilt and fear are often tied to the stories we tell ourselves. The fear is rarely about that moment itself, that dinner, that extra hour of work, but rather it is about the significance we have attached to it.
In other words, to say no can quickly lead people into catastrophic thinking. I have seen it in clients, and I have witnessed it in myself. The catastrophic thinking often goes a little something like this:
“If I don’t____(do the extra work) they’re going to think I am ____(lazy/a bad employee)”, which on some days can quickly fly to “and then I’ll lose my job, and how will I pay my rent, and they’re going to find out I was a fraud, and they never should have given me the job in the first place...”
Depending on your work, especially if you are in a social change or caring role, this story you tell yourself might be connected to a sense of responsibility you have, one that carries outside of your job titled and is deeply rooted in how you identify yourself. In both circumstances, I encourage you to take a deep breath and ask:
✨ “What is the Story I am telling myself?” and “Is it true?”
In some instances, yes, of course, you need to be checking your email/ having your phone on at wild hours, and not being available could cause a crisis. However, in many other instances, it is a sign that we have slipped into catastrophic thinking. It is human nature to imagine all the ways things can go wrong as we feel more comfortable preparing for terrible situations, try not to beat yourself up for it! (I speak more about this in my first blog here!)
If, on honest reflection, you find that the story you are telling yourself is almost entirely coming from a place of fear ( aka isn’t founded on objective evidence). I would encourage you to ask yourself:
✨ “How can I kindly and gently support myself to let this story go?”
I can't overstate how important kindness is! I so often see folks address setting boundaries in a way that breads more stress. “I should” statements can be really handy little red flags! Bullying ourselves and others to set boundaries is not helpful, and can often compound some of the negative feelings we are already experiencing! As much as people like to think, for example, I will simply close the laptop at 5 pm, if our thoughts are filled with guilt, the free time you’ve created doesn’t feel all that free!!
2. What Gives you Energy?:
I find the analogy of a simple battery helpful - we as human beings only have so much energy, so much capacity. Certain activities contribute to recharging our batteries, and other activities take energy. What’s important to remember is that we are all unique, something that fills me up might deplete someone else. But regardless of what activities fill you up/ deplete your energy, we all need to be filled up or we will crash and burn. I invite you to get clear on both:
✨ What gives me energy?
✨ What drains my energy?
With these things in mind, it can be much much easier to uphold a boundary. In other words, the boundary is not strictly about the act of saying "no", for example, but rather it is about what it is protecting.
BYCA, the incredible folks I trained with to become a Life Coach, would often remind us that boundaries are the action, not the outcome. This type of framing helps us to focus on what boundaries are supporting us to bring to life!
Some additional questions to support you to gain clarity might include:
If you were to uphold the boundaries you are trying to implement, what would they be protecting?
What would you have more of?
What would the positive impact be on your life?
How can you make it less about the act of “saying no” to someone else’s request, and reframe it as saying yes to yourself and your own needs?
3. Intentional Action
With an increased awareness of when we are choosing others’ needs over our own, as well as what we truly need to feel energized, the next step is to focus on how can we work on prioritizing ourselves.
In this final section, I provide a few suggestions to do just that!
Schedule it!
A go-to fav of mine, literally Setting/ Scheduling time that is JUST for you! Time to recharge your batteries, to fill up on what you need! I would invite you to pop it into your calendar and try to guard this time with the same vigour you would use to protect a specialist Drs appointment you’d waited six months to attend.
A quick check-in Q/ Mantra
With an increased awareness of how/when we are choosing others' needs above our own, the next step is to try to catch it in the moment and choose intentionally/consciously! Brene Brown speaks to this. She uses the example of being asked to make brownies for a bake sale at her daughter's school. She was exhausted and did not have the energy to do it.
Before responding asked herself: “Am I choosing difficulty or resentment?”.
She was clear that she did not want to make the brownies, but rather she felt like she was supposed to. So would she rather have the initially difficult conversation of saying “no, I don’t have the capacity right now,” or move forward, and make them with resentment? She recognized the way this resentment would likely trickle through to her family, and the negative impact it would have on all of them. With this in mind, she respects her capacity and says “no, I can’t make them.”
Let's be clear, this is HARD, but it is a practice, and the more we are clear on what we need, the easier it is to identify these moments and make these choices consciously! This is also why the questions above around “what is the story I am telling myself?” are so important!!
Ask for Help
One of the things that can be challenging is if it is not catastrophic thinking. If, for example, we are in a toxic work environment or a challenging family situation and asking ourselves questions or reframing our mindset really isn’t enough. So in these scenarios, I would encourage you to ask:
What support do I need?
Who do I need to be on my team?
How can I ask for this?/ How can I support myself to be open to receiving it?
We sometimes tell ourselves stories that we need to go it alone, but asking a family member for help minding a child, or having a conversation with a supervisor about workload can be tough, but can also facilitate massive changes for you. You deserve time and space. You deserve clarity. And you deserve joy.
The above do not need to be done in order, or followed in a rigid way! I have a feeling that if you are honest with yourself, one part stood out strongest to you. That’s the area I would encourage you to focus on. Remember that change takes time! You’ve got this!!
Please know that I share my experiences, learnings, and what has worked for me, with the hope that these perspectives and suggestions will support you to build a life you feel more excited, clear and confident every day.
If this post has felt supportive for you, but you are interested in more tailored support to meet your goals, check out more info on the 1:1 Coaching I offer or get in touch ♡
