Boundaries: Are too few (or too many) why we stay stuck?

May 18, 2021

Glennon Doyle:

Well, hi everybody. You came back. Thank you for coming back to We Can Do Hard Things. I’m really, really looking forward to today because today’s episode is about boundaries. And I have to tell you that the three great loves of my life are my family, coffee, and boundaries. Okay. As a deeply sensitive, socially anxious, introvert boundaries have been a matter of emotional and spiritual life and death for me, right? I am a person who loves humanity deeply, but humans are tricky for me. Right? And so learning how to human for the last 45 years has included much difficult learning about building boundaries and then having so many boundaries that I have to figure out how to unbuild boundaries. So let’s jump in today and we will figure out if you have too few or too many boundaries. Let’s go. Sissy, you here?

Amanda Doyle:

I’m here. Hi, G.

GD:

Hi, Sister.

AD:

What do you have for us today? What’s your hard thing?

GD:

Okay. So I want to talk today about boundaries, right? So boundaries are something that I have been trying to figure out for my entire life and have understood differently every decade. So first I think we should start off with each of our respective definition of boundaries because we can be talking about different things. Okay. So when I say boundaries, what I am talking about is that this idea that as human beings, it is our birthright, not to just default to everyone and everything, having constant and unlimited and unmitigated access to us, right? That part of being human is allowing, deciding who and what you will allow into your life. Right. And then holding that line. That’s what boundaries means to me, it’s the line that you hold that says that stuff or those people, or those ideas, or that behavior is not allowed in. And it is my right to hold that line. So what’s your definition of boundaries?

AD:

So for me, setting boundaries is the process of deciding what you’re responsible for. So this idea of like, it’s not just your yes or your no, but it’s deciding that you’re not responsible for everyone being okay with your yes or your no. I used to think about boundaries. Like there’s this boundary bucket. And as it’s a question of quantity, right, how much can I put my bucket? And then when do I need to say no, when my bucket is full and thinking about it if our boundaries are aligned with our capacity, we’re fine. But then I started totally rethinking that because, because if we do it that way, then how do we know that our bucket is full of the correct things? And then how do we know that something is not in our bucket that belongs to us. So for me, I’m newly thinking about it as this idea of what I’m responsible for in terms of what is mine to do, what is my business and everything else that I am not responsible for like your feelings about that, taking care of that thing, that’s not mine to do. That’s not my responsibility. And that’s my boundary.

GD:

Interesting. And it’s interesting that you used the word responsible for, because it kind of, I always think of the word responsible, meaning like I have to respond to that.

AD:

Yes. And I feel like sometimes we think of like, it’s all or nothing. If I take this one thing on, it’s inside my boundary, right? I’m taking on this task or this burden, I have to take everything else that goes with it. And for me, that’s not correct. It’s you may say that is mine to do, I’m responsible for doing X, but then you can at the same time say, but I’m not responsible for making you okay with me doing X. I’m not responsible for your perception of me because I’m doing X. I’m only responsible for doing X or not doing X.

GD:

Interesting. It’s like what we talk about when we’re navigating what we share with the world, right. And We say all the time, okay, we’re responsible for telling the truth, but we are not responsible for the way the world responds or receives that. Right. We’re responsible to the telling and the sharing, but we’re not responsible for the reaction. And that helps us set that boundary for art and for sharing. It’s so interesting. Okay. So Untamed is much about boundaries, right? There’s one story about creating boundaries that I shared in that book about when Abby and I fell in love and, and the family’s reaction. And so I thought we could tell that story because I think it’s helped people helped me learn about what kind of healthy boundaries are. And then later we’ll get into some of my less healthy boundaries. But so this is the island story, right? And I want it, I want to tell this, I want to hear your perspective because I’ve told this story so many times, but the world has never heard your version or experience of that. So back drop is that I fell in love with a woman, and it was a dramatic time because when this happened, I was in a broken marriage. And also as a very public person, I was married to a man and I was already a very public person. I had a book coming out. It was about the redemption of that marriage that I was in, and fell deeply in love with Abby. And so there was a lot of real life figuring out boundaries in that time. Right. Who do we tell, when do we tell it, how do we tell it, whose feelings are we responsible for? And you know, when I talk about that story, a lot of people want to hear how I navigated the boundaries of the world, right? Like how did we deal with the way the Christians felt about me being in love with a woman, or how did we navigate the way social media reacted and all of that was scary. And we’ll talk about that another time. But the hardest part for me was dealing with family.

AD:

Right.

GD:

It’s never harder to hold a boundary or to create a boundary or to navigate a boundary when it’s the people that you love the most.

AD:

Well, what’s that line from Untamed where you say, it’s not the criticism from the people that hate us, that keep us from doing what we need to do. It’s the love and concern of the people who love us.

GD:

Love us. Right? Yeah. That’s what shakes us. Right? So, the deal was that I told my parents about being in love with Abby and as you’ll learn in this podcast are the four of us, my mom, my dad, sister, and I are, I mean, we are very close. I think there’s a little bit of what might be seen as a bit of codependency, about how much we all can care about each other’s feelings. Right.

AD:

The tiniest bit.

GD:

So example, I put this in Untamed. One night I was talking to my mom and I’d probably talked to her six times a day. And she said, what are you doing in the morning? And I said, I’m going to go get a haircut. And she said, what are you going to do to your hair? And I said, well, actually, I’m thinking about cutting bangs. So we hung up. The next morning my phone rings at 6:00 AM. I answer. I’m like, oh my God, what’s wrong? It’s my mom. My mom says, hi, honey. Um, I just, I’m sorry to call so early, but I just really didn’t sleep last night. I just need to talk to you about something that’s worrying me. And I said, what mom? She said, it’s the bangs. I’m really worried. You don’t do well with bangs. You get bangs. And then, it’s years of Bobby pins and tears. And I just feel like your life is hard enough without bangs. And, you remember that?

AD:

To be fair, our family was not in a place to be able to emotionally assimilate to the bangs experience.

GD:

Right. Right. The banks were a bridge too far. So I’m just explaining that if this is a woman who stayed up all night because her daughter was about to get bangs, you can imagine how she reacted when her daughter told her that she was going to leave her husband and marry a female Olympian. Right. She was freaking terrified. Okay. And she tried to be loving with that terror, but every time I talked to her, I felt myself just spinning. Just I could hear the concern. Oh, but honey, what is the world gonna say? What about the kids, like the kid’s friends, the kids teacher, just like everything? I felt like I was explaining myself that I was trying to convince her that it was okay. I felt like a ten-year-old again, you know, trying to assert my independence. And it’s so fascinating because it’s like the people who love us, they just want us to be okay. Right. And they’re so afraid that the world is going to be fearful. And so they end up bringing the fear to us that they worry the world will bring to us. It’s not even the world that brings it, it’s them.

AD:

Right. Right. If they bring it to you first, then you can avoid having the reaction from the world who doesn’t even love you. They can bring it to your doorstep. You can say, oh, I don’t want that. And then you can stop. You can preempt whatever is going to come.

GD:

Right. It’s also this whole thing that, you know, there are generations and we have somehow equated worry with love. Right. So that’s a whole nother thing, but you, one day I called you, I think I used to hang up with mom and then just call you to bitch about whatever had just happened. Right. I think that was the general pattern of those times.

AD:

Historically, yes. And then mom would be calling in on the other line so she could report to me what was happening.

GD:

I mean, listen, poor Sister is just the translator. For everybody, for everyone in our family. So, I called you one day and said, I just spun. I said, she’s making me feel like I can’t do the thing. And I feel like I’m constantly justifying myself or explaining myself. And it just makes me so upset. And you said, do you remember what you said to me?

AD:

Yes. I believe I said something like, you’re so defensive of what you’re doing. And the only reason you need to be defensive ever is, if you feel like someone can take something from you, then you have to defend it. But you are a grown-ass woman and no one can take this from you. If you decide that Abby is what you want, and this life is what you want, you can stop defending it and just do it.

GD:

Yes. And I don’t know why that was so shifting. It was shifting for me. Right. It was like, that is it. It’s defensiveness or that sort of panic we have is only for people who feel like what they have can be taken. Right. And so I was enacting this wrong pattern or power thing with mom, which was like, it was almost an asking permission. Right? It’s like I was trying to convince her that it was okay  by telling her how okay it was, but no one has ever convinced anyone in the history of the world that they are okay by talking about how okay they are. Right. The only way we convince people that we’re okay, is we just go about being okay. And we allow them to witness it. And eventually they go, I guess she knew what she was doing.

AD:

Correct. Correct. And I think, it’s not that mom could have literally taken that away. It’s not that you would have not been able to do it if mom didn’t understand it. It’s this idea that, if we are not able to bring that, the people that we love in line, so they’re affirming our decisions, then we will not allow ourselves to do the thing that we need to do. So the taking it from you in your head was, well, if I can’t convince my mom that this is okay, can I convince myself that this is okay?

GD:

Yes. And that’s okay. So that’s what you’re talking about in terms of what I’m responsible for. I, for some reason, felt I was responsible for everyone feeling amazing about my decision, right? When in fact it wasn’t my job to convince anyone else, right. That that’s the part that was panicking me and taking me away from my knowing and taking me away from my peace. Right. That was mom’s job to figure out. And it was my job to just say, here it is, here’s the decision. Godspeed.

AD:

Right. And to be fair, it’s very hard to be responsible for your own decisions when you’re looking around at people who love you and care about you and they are not affirming those decisions. So it’s either, I’m not responsible for your reaction to my decision. And the equivalent of that is I am responsible for my decisions and having peace in making my decisions, regardless of anyone else understanding. Yet.

GD:

Yet. Yes.

AD:

Yet, this decision is the next right thing for me.

GD:

Yeah. I saw this meme recently that said, it’s not everyone’s job to understand your calling. It wasn’t a conference call.

AD:

Yeah. I saw that too. We’ll find who posted that.

GD:

We need to find out who said that because that’s so true. It’s amazing how many times I have had to, whether it’s in work in my family, in parenting, just be like, nobody gets this, but it’s right anyway. And eventually they will.

GD:

Okay. So here’s the rest of that story. So after that conversation that we had on the phone, I found myself, I think I was at a track meet. I was at one of Chase’s track meets, but anyway, I remember standing under a tree, mom called. I could just feel the fear, feel the worry in her voice, you know? And she said, we’re coming, dad and I are coming right to Florida. And I just remembered what you said. And I had this moment and I said, no, you can’t come. You cannot come. Because if you, because you are still afraid, you are afraid. And my children are not afraid. They don’t carry this fear of the world that you have for many reasons, because of the way we raise them because of the generation they’re from, because of the way we’re walking through this because of the people they are. And so if you come here, they will see the fear in your eyes and they will take it on. They will help you carry it because they love and trust you. Right. So it’s my job as their mother, as the parent, to make sure that they don’t feel like they have to carry that fear from you to make sure that that contagious fear doesn’t get to them. So I said, what I need to tell you, mom is I love you so much. And it sounds like you have a problem. I don’t have that problem. My kids don’t have that problem. This fear that you have is your problem. And so I need you to go on your own and figure out this problem that you have, which is your fear, right? And when you are ready to, when you’ve worked out that problem and you are ready to come to our family with nothing but respect and joy and celebration, then we will lower our drawbridge for you. But not one second sooner. I’m quite sure that I didn’t say it with that much eloquence, but that was the gist. Okay. And it was so weird. It was so weird. And I just remember mom being like, I think her exact words were, I will think about what you’ve said, honey.

AD:

I know. And God love her, she’s always trying. She’s always trying. But what you did in that moment is you clarified what she was not responsible for and what she was responsible for. Right. It’s not like you took away the fear from her, but you said, I am not responsible. I, Glennon, am not responsible for making you feel okay about it.

GD:

And mom, you’re not responsible for the way the world in the future responds to our family. But what you are wholly responsible for is how you respond to our family. Right. Because in all these situations, just being a teacher, just working with kids for so long, I believe that a kid can handle whatever the world brings to them. As long as at the end of the day, they know they can look at their parent and that their parent wouldn’t change a hair on their head. Right. Like, that’s what I have seen be true over and over again. But so often that the parents are so afraid that they bring the very fear that they’re worried exists in the world right to the doorstep.

AD:

And it’s amazing because it’s the same, it’s not a fundamental shift. I mean, if love from a parent in the situation we’re describing, is this like rushing flood. She was rushing towards you to try to help you not make a decision that she thought was going to be devastating to you and to your family. So, but it was just diverting that flood. Channel it this way. Channel it this way. And all of that love will be used effectively. But over here, this is not where your love belongs. Your love belongs channeled this way. And sometimes it’s a simple shift of understanding and a relief. Like I absolve you mom of responsibility to make the world okay for me. I absolve you of responsibility for my decisions. All you have to do is show up and love me.

GD:

Right. And by the way, it’s so interesting what happens then. Because I see people there’s so many different ways to react as a parent in this situation, but it seems like there is a couple major channels that people take. And one is, I am so afraid that I’m going to try to change you for the world. And then there is this other take that mom seems to have taken on, which is no, you’re perfect. And I am going to change the world for you. Okay. So what you listener might not know is that my mom is now the fiercest freaking activist in our family. Since this time, she’s probably been to more marches than we have. I mean, she and my dad show up with their little rainbow flags at gay pride marches by themselves, right. They have taken on this whole, I mean, my mom plans transgender remembrance ceremonies at her church. What kind of church does she go to Unitarian church?

AD:

Unitarian church.

GD:

Because the Christians were pissing her off too much with all the homophobia. So she’s political. She writes letters. She organizes, she has just goddamn cheetah-ed her way through this. She just said, okay.

AD:

Her flood is flowing in a totally different direction. It’s still the intensity. The same intensity that she was worried is now the intensity that she’s channeling for that. I mean, God love her. I’ll be like, can you babysit the kids? Oh, I’m sorry, honey. I’m down at the Senate. I just have a couple more hours of this particular action. So sorry.

GD:

Yes. It’s so fascinating. And by the way, it doesn’t always work that way. So many people set boundaries and they lose people.

AD:

Correct.

GD:

Right. I mean, that has happened to me, too. But the idea that when I mentioned, the drawbridge, and this idea in Untamed about the island metaphor is when we were first starting to tell our story to the public, I don’t know, maybe it was on social media. I don’t know, but I started to feel overwhelmed. The internet had feelings as it does about me and Abby. And so, you know, sometimes I’m really good at filtering that stuff out and sometimes I’m terrible at it. And I had a bit of a breakdown one night about some cruelty, some homophobia that was coming towards me and Abby sat me down and she said, okay, here’s what we’re going to do. She said, we are going to think of our love as an island. Okay. We have found the thing. We have found the thing we both have been looking for are our whole lives, where we have found this love that, you know, is so desperately wanted by human beings. We have it. It’s a treasure it’s on this island, it’s you and me and the kids and Craig. We are on this island. Our love is young. We have to protect it. Right. Everybody else and all of their opinions are on the other side of the moat. And our moat has crocodiles in it, crocodiles in it. And we will only lower the drawbridge for love, wild acceptance, celebration. Right. And they can yell and scream as much as they want on the other side of that moat, we can’t even hear them. We’re too busy over here, dancing on our island. Right. And that is the metaphor that we carry all the time. And it’s so interesting because I think that sometimes we make the mistake of thinking, okay, it’s my job. And especially for women, okay. It’s my job to make sure that everybody on my island loves and respects and accepts me and my family. And I think actually it’s like, no, our job and joy is to only allow people on our island to already do respect and love and celebrate us. Right. So, you know, we talk all the time about what if we have a co-builder in our life, or if we’re building on our own, just thinking about what are the non-negotiables like, what are the things that we will not allow on our island ever? And it’s so interesting because it’s often not. I think we say, we think that, that we have to decide what people are allowed on and off, but then that’s what screws us up. Right. Because if you decide that well, obviously my mom’s allowed on my island, what happens if she’s bringing some early homophobia? No. Right. If we decide, well, obviously my father-in-law’s allowed on my island. What happens when he brings his racism? Like the hard thing is that our non-negotiables are often ideas and things and people, even if they’re the people closest to us, don’t get to come on and bring it. Right. I mean, the time, the moment I had to tell my mom, no, you may not come on my island was I think the hardest boundary I’ve ever set, sort of a final frontier for me. And I think the moment when I became an adult, the moment when a mother and a daughter became two mothers, right. It was like, oh no, no, no, no, no. You had your chance to build your island. Now it’s my turn. It’s my turn. You’re a guest. Now you’re not a co builder with me. Right?

AD:

Yeah. Your protection, your attempt to protect me is interfering with my protection of my children.

GD:

So, so if I have a choice to choose between daughter and mother, I’m choosing mother every time, right? Okay. Let’s take a break. And when we come back, we will answer some hard questions about boundaries.

AD:

Hi, Sister. Okay. We have questions. All right. Our first one is from Lindsey.

Lindsey (caller):

Hi G and Sister. This is Lindsey and I’m calling for some advice. So I recently set a pretty tough boundary with my mother-in-law, which actually took a lot of courage and I’m really proud of myself for doing it. And in the moment, she seemed to handle it well, and I felt good about it going forward. And then the next day she called my husband to complain and she also called my sister-in-law to gossip about it, which as you can imagine, didn’t feel great. And now she’s being really cool to me in person. And the whole thing feels like a big mess. And I just kind of don’t know where to go from here. So any advice you have, help me please. Love you both.

GD:

Yes. This feels very familiar. Okay. So Lindsey, what I have learned is that the hard part of setting boundaries is not actually the setting of the boundary. It’s actually not saying the thing. That’s not the hardest part. Okay. The hardest part of boundaries is withstanding whatever happens next. Okay. The hard part of boundaries is being okay with the outcome and the outcome of setting a boundary is usually people having feelings about it.

AD:

It’s like that Seinfeld episode where it’s like the taking of the reservation isn’t the important part of the reservation. It’s the keeping of the reservation. That’s the most important part of the reservation.

GD:

That is it. That is it. So that the pattern is that we finally get the nerve to set the boundary with somebody. Right. But we are so conditioned and obsessed with being liked that when the person has feelings about it or when the person’s mad at us or disappointed or cold or gossips, we take that as a sign that we did something wrong. That there’s a problem that we now have to fix. And then we go about fixing things, which is usually an undoing of the boundary, right? So it’s like two parts, setting boundaries is two parts. It’s the first part where you’re saying the thing and setting it. And then it’s the second harder part, which is being like a strong little tree in a storm when the storm starts. And everyone has the feelings just staying rooted and grounded until it passes. Right. So Ithis is just reminding me of something that happened to me a while back. Okay. So quick story. So my kids go to school, right. And I have a complicated relationship with, when my kids were in elementary school. Like I never, whenever I go to school too, for a school event, I end up feeling like I did an actual school. Like, I don’t know where to stand. I don’t know which moms to stand with or sit with. I’m not in on the social happenings of like the PTA while I’m very grateful I’m not in on it because of many reasons. So I feel a little bit anxious sometimes when I’m visiting school. And so I have also, because I’m an introvert and all the things I have maintained over time that when I’m at school, I’m there to like see my kid and be with my kid. And I’m not very social. Right. Which works out fine usually. But there was a time recently where I realized that my kid was having trouble with another kid and I knew this other kid’s mom. Right. So I call the mom and I say, oh my gosh, this sucks. Like let’s help them figure it out. Okay. And she says, well, actually this has been going on for six months. And I said, wait, what, what, why didn’t you tell me about this? And she said, well, honestly, I find you to be unapproachable. Okay, Sister, you, I’m sure you remember this day.

AD:

I do.

GD:

I am sure that you remember me calling you from the car hysteric, like freaking out. I thought this was the worst thing that had ever, I thought that this was failure. Like some kind of terrible failure as a woman that my kid could have been struggling. And one of these mothers did not find me approachable. Right. I thought being an unapproachable was the worst thing that somebody could say about me. So later that night I call Liz. You know, Liz is the, besides you, the other person that I talk about my challenges, my very many challenges.

AD:

Gilbert, yes.

GD:

And I told her this story and I said, and then, and then she said, I’m unapproachable. And Liz was quiet. And then she said, okay. So, so what’s the problem? And I said, she called me unapproachable. And Liz said, okay, so do you want to be approached? And I said, no. And she said, okay, well done. Good job, honey head. That’s what she calls me, honey head. And I thought, oh my gosh, okay. So the consequence of me taking care of myself in that school situation, right, is that some people might have perceptions of me when we set a boundary. Other people might have perceptions of us and what our businesses is, is the boundary. What our business is not, is other people’s definitions of, or perceptions of that boundary. Does that ring true?

AD:

It does. I think it’s totally natural. I mean that mother-in-law of Lindsey, she’s obviously using the tools she has and if she’s gossiping and that’s one thing, that’s not the healthiest tool, but everyone is always just adapting. They’re either adapting to the boundaries you don’t set, or they’re adapting to the boundaries that you do, right? So you can either choose to not upset the ecosystem and keep it the way it’s always been. Or you can choose to set something. In which case there’s going to be shifts that happen around you. And I guess it’s just, it comes down to what you always say, Glennon, and which is like, you can either disappoint other people or you can disappoint yourself. But if maintaining the status quo and not setting your boundary isn’t nothing. It is in fact disappointing yourself because you are aware of a boundary that you are then not maintaining because of the disturbance in the force.

GD:

Right, the disturbance in the force. So you just count the cost beforehand. You say, I understand that I’m going to set this boundary and that there might be ripples and consequences that I will have to withstand in the short term because we teach people how to treat us. And when we set a boundary, we’re changing something, we’re changing a pattern that people have become comfortable with. So when we change a pattern, people become uncomfortable and that is, oh, okay. It is okay to allow people to be uncomfortable so that you can find some comfort in the relationship. Right. And, I think it’s also okay to just say, that’s the price. And I’m willing to pay that price because I have fought so hard for my peace that I think maintaining it is more important to me actually in this moment than being liked and approved.

AD:

And it’s helpful because then that is a consequence that will happen. So it’s not, it doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with your boundary. It means it’s a natural consequence of setting boundaries. It doesn’t mean that you’ve missed.

GD:

No, it just means it’s working. Carry on.

AD:

Okay. We have another question. This one’s from Kathleen. And she wrote, I understand my boundaries in general. In general, they are very clear to me. But when someone crosses one in real life, everything suddenly feels less clear. And I never reacted in real time in a way that feels honoring of my boundaries. Ooh. I feel that one,

GD:

Me, too.

AD:

Because it’s so often feels like my boundaries are in conflict with expectations the whole world seems have agreed on. How can you tell if your boundaries are reasonable or whether you’re just being high maintenance?

GD:

Oh, Kathleen. I feel this one so deeply. First of all, I think, you know, words like high-maintenance or even controlling sometimes, control freak, difficult. These are words that people say about women who have thoughts and opinions. And so, you know, I’m always on the lookout for not being too concerned about those words. But what I really connect to in this question is that I have so many boundaries that I have accepted the rest of the world may not have. Right. It’s like boundaries are, they’re not universal often. They’re often specific to you, right? So the whole world may have decided that this one thing doesn’t cross their boundary, but it might still cross yours and the whole world acclimating to it doesn’t matter. It matters what fits you, Kathleen. Right? So you have to listen to you or you will be forever frustrated and bitter. So I have a hundred examples of these boundaries that don’t make sense to other people. I mean, we could talk about one of the things that constantly appalls people is my texting boundary. It’s one way that the world just decided we were going to communicate with each other without asking anyone’s permission, this idea of texting that, you know, any time of the day, no matter what I’m doing at any point, someone can just send me a text as if they’re just like sending me an IOU, right. Or an IO them, right. I’m just minding my own business, trying to like stay balanced throughout the day, which is very difficult. Just trying to do all the things I have to do. Just trying to, you know, human my way through the day. But at any moment, anyone who happens to be who needs something from me or think of me or whatever, can just send me a text and then I am obligated to stop whatever I’m doing and write them back. Okay. And then, if I don’t write them back, then I’ll get like a passive aggressive thing. That’s like, I don’t know if you saw this? And then if I dare not to write back to that, if I happen to see that human being …

AD:

Are you okay?

GD:

Oh my God

AD:

Are you okay? I just didn’t know. Is everything okay? Because I didn’t know. I get that all the time.

GD:

And I just feel like I cannot spend all day indebted to people that I didn’t ask …

AD:

For input from.

GD:

For input from. Right. And then I’ll feel guilty. So like half day, I’m thinking about all of these people that I owe something to. Right. So then if I decide to actually text them back, because I will literally write on my things to do text this person back, text this person back, text this person back, which takes me longer than it would just text the person back.

AD:

Yes, of course. Especially when you rewrite it on all of your lists, cause you definitely didn’t do it the day you were supposed to.

GD:

Every day for a month. Right. And then I go to bed with shame that I didn’t text the person. Right. But here’s the thing about texting. You text them back, you finally write it, take it off your to-do list. And then what happens?

AD:

They text you back.

GD:

It’s a never ending, it’s untenable.

AD:

It’s the tyranny of the text truly. It’s also like when did we decide to take this on as a side hustle, just a whole nother part-time job that we’re just going to be in constant communication with people all day long about various things?

GD:

I know it’s like we’re talking about it in a funny way, but I actually feel it’s not right on a deeply human, spiritual level. Like I do not wake up in the morning on this earth to be in constant response to everyone else. Like I actually want to be in creative mode. I don’t mean I’m writing books all the time. I just mean I want to intentionally decide what to do with my time. And I don’t want to constantly be owing everybody. It’s just, it’s a new thing. This is not the way that humanity has lived until like yesterday. Right. When we all decided we owe each other constant check-ins. So anyway, I don’t text people back. Right. And I know that it hurts people’s feelings, but it hurts my feelings more to try to do it.

AD:

There are two sets of feelings here, people. I’m choosing mine.

GD:

To the point where, when I got married at my wedding, so Abby and I made our wedding list. At first, we had everyone we love on our list. Right. And it was like way too huge. So we said, okay, let’s do everyone we love and like.

AD:

Mmm, big difference.

GD:

And then it was like 20 people, right? So we had like 25 people at our wedding, all at a big table. And I stood up and I said, thank you for coming to our wedding. And what I want you to all do is look at each other. And I want you to tell your neighbor if I’ve ever texted you back. Okay. And so I want to take this moment to prove that it is not personal. I love and like you. You’re here, but I will never text you back. Okay. So, anyway, texts are not the boss of me. I will not be ruled by texts.

AD:

Well, it’s just an example of like, things that don’t work for you. Like, just because there’s a new thing that everyone’s doing, just because it works for the person who is texting you, it is in fact convenient for them to reach out. That mode of communication works for them. It, it doesn’t mean that you should shift yourself to make that work for you.

GD:

No, that’s right. That’s exactly right. And you have to know yourself to, I am an anxious person. The idea that I would add this level of anxiety that makes me feel buzzy. It makes me feel ungrounded. I just don’t choose it because I know myself. And I think there’s plenty of my friends when I talk about this, they look at me like I have lost my mind. They have no idea what I’m talking about.

AD:

True. That’s very true.

GD:

Texting causes them no extra anxiety.

AD:

It’s delightful actually for people. It’s the difference between people are like that either feels like a happy little moment throughout their day, or it feels like someone just poking you in the forehead all day long.

GD:

Okay. That’s what I feel. I feel like it’s someone poking me in the forehead and then getting mad that I didn’t smile and hug them after they poked me in the forehead.

AD:

But that’s what I mean, we’re not making a universal commentary on the texting. It’s just, there are different experiences of that. And if it doesn’t work for you, you do not need to succumb to the tyranny of the texts. You need to just explain that that is not part of your life.

GD:

Right. So then the funny thing is that people will be like, okay, then should I call you? And I’m like, hell no.

AD:

Hell no!

GD:

Are you out of your mind? Should I come to your house then? Oh no, for Christ’s sake.

AD:

Oh my gosh, what is this? The eighties? We’re not calling people.

GD:

It’s not the sixties. We’re not coming to their home.

AD:

Actually. It’s so dramatic that I will text people in advance of the very rare time that I have to call them about something and say, I’m about to call you. Everything’s okay. Everyone’s healthy. Nothing’s wrong because people are so alarmed if I actually call them that they think, well, someone has perished.

GD:

Yes, yes. Right. So, so that is a boundary. Texting is a boundary for me. Sister, what is a boundary that you don’t think is healthy that you’re trying to let burn?

AD:

Boundaries have been a struggle for me to understand my whole life, because I feel like when you grow up, like we did with a dominant personality, like there’s one person in your family whose emotional fluctuations kind of dictate the experience of other family members. You learn very early to be highly emotionally attuned to that person’s emotional calibration. So you can kind of stay one step ahead, so you can keep the peace and all that. And so I kind of did that my whole life and then only learned much after that that’s an actual thing that like folks who experienced that have kind of practice called emotion monitoring, which basically means that they’re living all of their lives and all of their personal relationships in this kind of hyperactive awareness of everyone else’s experience in that moment. And you learn that your role is kind of show accommodate, keep everyone comfortable. And you’re so busy being a fixer in that situation that you lose touch with the fact that you’re actually having your own experience. So in other words, you have completely lost any boundary between everybody else’s experience of a situation and your own experience of the situation, because yours is theirs.

GD:

So this is the situation where you and I will be at a restaurant and we will not even be enjoying our experience, even having an experience because we will be worried that a person at the next table is talking too loud or a person at the table over there is having a bad experience. Or we’re on eggshells constantly because we learned that we have to make this environment perfect. So that this one person doesn’t get upset.

AD:

Yeah. I mean, it got to the point for me, where airplanes were untenable for me. I mean, it would be like the guy in 16E, he is taking up too much space and that girl doesn’t have enough space and that baby is crying. And I’m so worried about that mother. And also that person is talking too loud and their earphones are up too loud and this whole thing, and I’m responsible for all of this, all of this. And, it’s a sick place to live for yourself. And for people who then are watching you. So I recently, my son is a high monitor as well. And I have seen him recently say things like, why is so-and-so so upset about that? Like very subtle, you know, please don’t be mad at so-and-so. And this pattern of handing down is what I need to break. And so it’s a boundary that I’m working on. So I have just started practicing the boundary of that. I am not responsible for the energy in the room when in fact the reality is that everyone is responsible for their own experience right now. And not only am I not responsible for theirs and getting upset when they’re having bad behavior and defending the one who isn’t having justice in her seat, you know, it’s like, I am actually responsible for my experience. And in being responsible for everyone else’s, I’m absolving myself of being responsible for making this experience the best one it can be for me and my family instead of taking on all the emotions, good, bad, and ugly in the room.

GD:

Well then, because we’re ruining our kids’ lives. I mean, Chase said to me, we were playing a game recently where we were asking each other deep questions or something, and one of the questions said something like, what would you change about this person, me, that you think would make their life better? That was the question. And Chase said, okay. I guess I would say, I wish you were better able to adapt to different situations without having to control everything so much to be comfortable. I wish you could just be more comfortable in many different situations. And I know, and what Chase means that he has grown up worried all the time about every room he’s in, because he’s worried about his mom’s experience.

AD:

He’s seeing it through your eyes. What is okay to you? That’s exactly right. I mean, I got to the point where I was trying to rush, like growing up really special, wonderful events, just wanting them to be over instead of enjoying this.

GD:

Yes. And then recently Abby said to me that she feels herself having more anxiety in any social situation. Why? Because if somebody starts interrupting, she knows the interrupting is one of my boundaries. And so she’s worried that this person is interrupting and now I’m going to freak out or this person’s dominating the whole conversation. And she knows that I hate that so much. And so she’s constantly living the experience through her fear of how I’m living the experience and, you know, it’s tricky because I think that people who are highly sensitive tend to have to as coping mechanisms, create all kinds of boundaries around them, right? Like, I’ll never forget, Abby and I were at an hotel and we went down, pre COVID obviously, we went down to the like free breakfast or whatever. We walked into this free breakfast room. Okay. It was 12 minutes of hell. Okay. There was like a baby screaming at this table. And then the mom was working so hard to try to help the baby. But the dad was just watching CNN without doing a damn thing, leaving this woman, just screaming, like the baby was not even belonged to him. There was a man and a woman arguing, so unkindly over at a table, there was a kid trying to get her cereal, but no one would help her. And she’s so upset. Right. So the whole thing was so overwhelming. We get back to our room or maybe just to the elevator. We walk into the elevator and I am holding a roll. That’s it? I have a roll. Okay. I don’t eat a roll for breakfast. Abby has her whole breakfast. She goes, what happened? What, what happened? Why don’t you have anything? I’m like, what do you mean? Like we were just in a war zone. Right. I was just trying to get through it. I was just trying to get out of there. And she was like, what? She had a lovely experience. She had not noticed none of it. Well, she got her breakfast.

AD:

Not only did she not notice it, like you actually had those experiences, you were the mom who was trying to enjoy it. It’s hard to explain, but you’re actually that experience is your experience. So you walk out having had all those experience completely depleted. And it’s why, and it’s why social experiences are exhausting because you are having the experience of every person in the room. And you’re metabolizing all of that all at once while also trying to be your own self in the room. It’s exhausting.

GD:

It’s exhausting. And I do believe that being a highly sensitive person has helped me figure out all of my boundaries. Right? As we talked about earlier in the episode, I have created an island, right? What I would say about that now in my life is that the challenge of my life is that I’m always overdoing everything.

AD:

Moderation is not your bag.

GD:

No. If you tell me like this face cream, this mask, if you put it on for six minutes, it will change your life. I’m like, well, if it will change my life at six minutes, what if I leave it on for six hours? Always, right. There’s zero moderation. And so I have boundaried myself so much Sister, and you know this, that Abby and I talk about all that. Like, I don’t have any friends. Everything bothers me. Right? Everything’s a deal breaker. So I have overdone the boundaries. I spent so long creating this self, knowing like who I am and what I need and what I’ll accept and what I won’t, that now I have this amazing sense of self, but nobody else. Because if you cannot tolerate interrupting, if you cannot tolerate people talking too much, if you cannot tolerate people using loud voices, if you cannot tolerate, like people are people. And so at what point, I remember talking to Liz Gilbert about this and being like, I feel like I have spent my thirties and forties figuring out my sense of self and my boundaries. And now I have to spend the next decade, somehow disintegrating all of it. Right? And that seems so exhausting. And like, it was all worthless. And she did tell me a story about how she was working with this spiritual guide who said that we do all inevitably have to figure out that the self is not real, that we’re all connected, but that the only way that she can help people get to that part is when they’ve already created a strong sense of self. So it seems to be a pattern that we have to do first before we can. But Abby and I do talk all the time about the fact that we want to go into this next decade of our lives and like add more people to our island. Figure out how to have friends, right.

AD:

To me, it goes back to like my definition of boundaries being deciding what you’re responsible for, that you are actually not responsible for the fact that somebody else doesn’t act the way you want them to. You’re not responsible for someone else’s interrupting. That’s literally not your business.

GD:

I know, but it just upsets me because I feel so strongly about everybody getting a chance to show themselves, to talk. And then some people takes longer for them to finally reveal the thing and finally say the thing. So when somebody is finally saying the thing and then somebody else comes in and cuts them off, it makes me want to stick a fork in their eye. Right. Because I feel like they’re ruining that other person’s experience of life.

AD:

Right. So taking responsibility for that other person’s experience life.

GD:

Yeah, who I don’t know.

AD:

Let’s just be totally clear and yes, that’s obnoxious and annoying, but it is not yours to carry.

GD:

No. And just to be clear while I’m worried that that is going to ruin everyone’s experience, I am for sure ruining everyone’s experience.

AD:

A hundred percent. You’re ruining everyone’s experience because you are sending out the energy that everything is not okay in this situation.

GD:

Right. Like I want us all to be kind and I will kick everyone’s ass if they’re not.

AD:

I will reign terror over this until everyone is comfortable.

GD:

That’s exactly right. Okay. So what is a boundary that you are trying to work on setting?

AD:

If setting boundaries is this process of deciding what you’re responsible for? It seems I made the decision a long time ago that I am solely responsible for myself. So that boundary makes parts of me inaccessible. It kind of stunts my relationships in ways. And I think with my husband, John. So I view when I’m struggling, when I’m worried, when I’ve hurt, it’s very hard for me to ask for help. It’s hard. It’s very hard to say that I’m having a hard time because that, to me suggests that I’m not doing the thing I’m responsible for, which is taking care of myself. So, what I’m trying to do is tear down this boundary that I’m responsible for handling all of my shit with no help and no support from the people who love me. So I’m just practicing saying things like, I’m having trouble. Or I’m really struggling with this because it does come out no matter what, I’m just much more comfortable with anger than I am admitting that I’m having trouble taking care of things.

GD:

We call that in our family the bulletproof vest. Anger’s like the bulletproof vest that we put on over fear.

AD:

Right. So that’s how it comes out. Instead of just being like I’m really struggling with this. And that’s why I am acting this way instead of just being like, well dammit, if I could get some help around here and maybe I will. So that is my boundary I’m working on.

GD:

Brené calls that, let’s try to be scared without being scary.

AD:

Yes. Yes. I am straight to scary.

GD:

Scary spices. We are. Okay. Let’s move on to the Next Right Thing. This week I think that the Next Right Thing should just be this, let’s all just think of one boundary that we want to set. And one boundary that we want to let burn, and let’s not even worry about doing it. Let’s just write it down first. That’s your job for this week. That’s it. Thank you so much for being with us this week. And we will see you back here next Tuesday, when things get hard this week, don’t forget. We can do hard things. Right, Sissy.

AD:

Right, Sissy.