Welcome to the new manager podcast.
I'm your host, Kim nickel. Hello and welcome.
I'm glad you're here and I hope you're doing well.
Today's episode is a little bit different because it is the
audio of a workshop that I taught back in November the
workshop was on boundaries with love and I was sharing also.
My favorite kind of know which is the gentle know when you
deliver a know It is a gentle. No, with a lot of love behind
it. It actually feels really good.
Like it can feel good to give a gentle know and it can feel good
to hear a gentle. No.
And it can create more connection more trust and just
strengthen relationships with people who are important to us.
Because of the timing of when I did this Workshop, there were
some questions about how to use boundaries with Family at the
holidays. And so, that's why I thought it
would be really helpful to share this with you.
Now, as we are in December coming into the end of the year
and we are in that holiday season.
One of the things I love about teaching, my students and
working with my clients on having the confidence to have
boundaries to know, How to use them effectively is that you
will use them in your workplace but also in your personal life
and I think that's just a really great thing to have.
It's really great to feel comfortable and confident in how
you communicate, boundaries how you advocate for yourself, how
you give feedback any of these? Contexts, it's just a great
skill to have, so I won't keep you any longer.
A longer you might take some notes but here we go, boundaries
with love. This is boundaries with love as
we get started, I wanted to share a few specific guidelines
for how I want us to use this time.
So number one, please take great care of yourself and what that
means is, if you want to be off camera, be off camera.
If you need to be eating food, right now, you can eat some food
if you need to. To get a glass of water, do
that? If there is a child or an animal
nearby that needs your attention?
It's okay to tend to that. Like I really want you to stay
connected to yourself and just know, like, what do you need in
order to have the experience here at that will be of greatest
service to you. That also means that if you have
a question, you can post that in the chat as we go.
So is everyone, okay, taking really great care of yourself,
at least for the next 45 minutes.
Yeah, okay, excellent. So when I know that excellent,
thank you Laura and when you know that, then we can all be
more present, kind of just knowing how our expectations
are, how we're going to use our time and realize people will
come and go and that's fine too. So This topic of boundaries with
love has been coming up a lot both like for me in the course
of my own life but also I think especially around the holidays.
It's a topic that comes up in our personal relationships and
also in our work relationships. And so, when I talk about
boundaries, there are two ways that I find incredibly helpful
to think about them that I want to share with you.
And the first is thinking of a boundary as an agreement that
you make with your self. So for example, in our time here
you might have this agreement with yourself in part because I
invited you into it. But this agreement of I'm going
to take really good care of myself while I'm in this
meeting. That's an agreement.
I'm going to make with myself so I'm going to make some decisions
as we go based on that agreement.
That's my boundary. Like if I get thirsty, I'm going
to go get a glass of water. That's just how I do.
So you can think of it as that. It's an agreement that you make
with yourself and what's really nice about that is, when you
think of a boundary in those terms, you're not trying to get
something from somebody else, you're not trying to change
their behavior, you're not trying to make them feel or be a
certain way. It's just, what is it that you
are in agreement with yourself about and the agreement around
self-care that sense of I'm going to take really great care
of myself, is so nice because then you do not require the
other person to do that for you. But now I'll give you some
examples more of what I mean by that, is we go.
But I just want to start with this idea that it's an
agreement, you make with yourself.
It is not necessarily an agreement that You tell somebody
else like, hi. My name is Ken.
You should understand. These are my boundaries.
I expect you to adhere to them and if you don't we will have a
problem right? Like that is not what we're
doing. It's like oh I'd know that this
is, you know this is this is my agreement with myself the other
way that I found very helpful to think about boundaries
especially with respect to time and what you say yes to what you
Agree to you. And what you say no to is to
remember that boundaries can simply be a way of organizing
your time. So, for example, if you have an
open Saturday, there's nothing scheduled on that Saturday.
That doesn't mean that it's available for other people.
Someone says, oh, what are you doing on Saturday?
Can you come help me with X y&z? You might decide for yourself.
Oh, I've already allocated that time to something else.
I've decided, I'm using that time for absolutely nothing.
Like, it's just a way of being organized.
What is that time for? And when you think of it in
those terms that also gets you out of feeling like, oh, this
person has crossed a boundary because they are asking for my
time and they should know that I'm already overextended.
I already have a full plate. It's nobody's job to know what
your energy is. It's nobody's job to know how
you organize your time. Like, you can take that full and
loving responsibility for it for yourself, and then, it makes
things less personal because, of course, people want to spend
time with you, or, of course, people want to, you know, you to
help them with things at work in your personal life, all over, of
course they do. So your work is to think about,
okay? What are my agreements with
myself? And how can I think about my
time as like how can I just be organized with my time and then
make decisions from there about what I say yes to and what I say
no to. And all of this this is why this
is a class on boundaries with love.
We're doing it from a place of love and care both for
ourselves, as well, as for the relationships that we have with
others. And what I found is that for So
many of us are experienced of boundaries, arises as a response
to injury or as a reaction to something happening, that
doesn't feel good. And then we think, oh I'm the
person is crossing my boundaries or oh, why did I not set good
boundaries with that person or with that situation, or with my
job? Why am I working?
So many hours? I have no boundaries and I just
say yes to everything. So I want to be helpful, right?
And so we often have this initial experience with
boundaries as something that doesn't feel good.
It becomes something that we use as a tool to defend ourselves
right to like throw up a barrier or as a way to like protect,
right? So boundary as defensive or
boundary as protection but when we shift a little bit and we
think about boundaries from this place of love, that will give us
connection like connection to self and then also Others, which
feels good and it expands what's possible.
So, it becomes an expansive tool rather than a defensive tool.
Because when you have clarity about what you need and how you
like to work and kind of what works for you, it allows you to
show up feeling really present and kind of expanding the
possibilities of what's, what's available.
How can we do this? This yeah, like by boundary is
like I know I'm home by 10:00 p.m., I don't stay out late.
All right, so I can be available for this but, but not for that.
How can we do this from a place of Love That expands
possibilities and creates more connection?
I think one of the reasons why we often hesitate with
boundaries is because it feels like we're breaking connection.
It feels like we're trying to distance.
It's ourselves or put like a barrier between us and somebody
else and that can feel heavy can feel tiring.
It can feel difficult. But when you think about, oh no,
I'm going to establish this boundary because this expands
things like it expands the things that I want and it
creates more connection and that feels really good, that then
allows us to feel more safe to have more Trust.
All of these qualities that actually make things easier.
Now with boundaries also I do want to acknowledge a couple of
things. One is that they can be very
informed by the culture in which we live work and grow up.
So that includes the business culture, like the culture of the
organization that you work in, there might be very subtle or
very explicit expectations. Options about how you use your
time, for example. And that can feel like a harder
situation in which to establish boundaries but also in our
families, in our communities, in the places where we grow up,
there can be different social norms, or different expectations
around, kind of what's, okay to say yes to and what's okay to
say no to. And so when you realize in your
own life, It feels like setting. A boundary feels really hard for
it. Feels like I'm really going to
let someone down. It feels really heavy than one
of the reasons why that could be is because is there like a, a
bigger cultural weight that is kind of conveying, this message
of what is expected of you and it helps to be aware of that.
Because then when you are establishing a boundary and
you're doing it with love, you can have the understanding of
why it might feel challenging, right?
And also feeling into how do I want to do this in a way that
maintains connection and continues to create good
relationships? If there are any questions that
about what I've shared so far that you either want to either
drop into the chat or if you want to come off of mute and
share, I invite you to To do that as well.
My my mind started racing and what all kind of an attachment
when you were talking, but I had kind of a realization about my
boundary but my boundaries I have a I have a tendency to
Ghost and I was thinking that It just kind of popped up for me
that, oh, I think. That's because in having loose
boundaries earlier and in relationships, it kind of builds
up, builds up till I can't handle it.
And then I'm like, oh too much got to get out of here and that
I just kind of had a realization about that as he were talking.
Yeah, that is such a great insight and also very relatable,
because before I before, I had boundaries before, I felt
comfortable with them. I sort of do similar, I thought
of it as like just absorbing, it's not a big deal, just absorb
it just, you know, go a long. Don't Don't Rock the Boat.
Don't make a big fuss about it and I would Zorb absorb absorb
until finally, like one small thing and I would just, I would
I didn't explode often, I'm not an Exploder, I'm an imp loader.
So instead of lashing out, I kind of lash in at myself
because I was not wanting to have a conversation with someone
directly. So I kind of lash in and then
just remove myself. Yeah.
So it makes a lot of sense to, and we understand like, oh, that
makes sense like that was what that was my.
That was my chosen strategy at the time because I didn't know
how to have a conversation. Or I didn't know how to deal
with someone else's. Emotional world or my own
emotional world you know. And I think to for so many of us
we grow up in families where the adults also don't really model
boundaries in a beautiful way and so we can learn.
I guess what to expect is I just need to get along or I just need
to be a good team player, right? It's you know it's just it's not
something that I think we often learn directly.
And then it makes sense. That then as adults it can we
just continue to use this strategy that seemed to work
before like until it doesn't anymore?
Okay, I have a couple examples I want to share right?
Because some of this is kind of conceptual and and part of this
too is I want to help. I want to help all of us shift
from oh, I kind of get it on the surface like intellectually,
that makes sense and then help to drop it down into something
that feels more doable. Right, and also give some more
clear examples of what that looks like in practice.
Because the other thing about us as humans is, we will always do
first, our habit, the thing we've done before.
Even if it doesn't work because it feels familiar and it's just
like this is, this is the part where I say yes and then I'm
like, why did I say yes to that, right?
We tend to just have to get to know patterns and habits.
So I want to start to Introduce not just the concept, the
concept can be really simple but how we apply it.
That's where there's a lot of nuance, we kind of want to feel
our way into it and I'll actually the other thing I'll
share to that that will be helpful as you think about this
long term, it truly only takes a small shift to create a big
change. So when you're thinking about
boundaries where do you want to have them, where could they be
Be better think about the easy places as well as the hard
places because you'll start to practice them in all areas of
your life. And what we tend to do,
especially when we're implementing a learning like
this, where it requires communication with others and
where it requires an awareness of yourself of like tuning in to
what you need, the tendency is to stay in the habit.
Until there's like a really big problem.
And then we try to use this tool for the very first time with the
biggest hardest challenge. And instead, I want to invite
you to start thinking about what are the small like what are the
light lifts? What is a easy places where I
can start to practice this and start to feel more confident in
this new way of being with boundaries and also where the
stakes are pretty low or it won't feel as scary.
Like, there's not so much at risk, so it's a, it's a skill.
It's a thing that you can practice, and as you get more
familiar with it, it starts to feel easier and more like, oh,
this is just what I do now for Ample few years ago actually I
was like several years ago. At this point I was starting a
new job with a start-up small group of people really
tight-knit team. I wanted them to like me, okay,
new at the job, I wanted them to like me.
I wanted to be a team player. I wanted to do a really good
job, well, our team was planning an event and the manager was
saying, okay, you know, you're all the things that need to
happen. And I want you to come early to
help us set up and, you know, bring these things.
And in that moment, I had two thoughts.
One thought was, I don't want to do that because I had other
plans and I wasn't planning to get there early.
And the other thought at the exact same time was I want them
to like me and want to be a team player.
I think I need to say yes. Right.
So in that moment these two thoughts and what I did was I
actually kind of I raised my hand and said, oh, you know, I
am not available to come early, but I can stay late.
And I'm happy to help with cleanup and break down at the
end and the manager. Paused, I was like, oh, okay,
great, no problem. And what super interesting is
that afterwards, after the meeting, we were leaving the
room and the manager kind of pulls me aside.
And she's like, Kim, I just I want to thank you for saying no
to me earlier and I was like oh why?
And she said because I know I can trust you.
I can trust you to say. No to me, I don't have to worry
that you'll say yes and then flake or that you'll say yes and
get burned out because you're overextending yourself.
Thank you for telling me. And it was this.
Incredible realization of wow. Okay.
So when I was staying connected to myself and what I needed,
right? With my schedule and my time
commitment, the desire of I want to be a team player but not in
that. That way here's how I can help
out. I want to offer this as an
alternative and realizing that for her it actually created more
trust and more clear connection and communication which
ultimately is what I wanted to do.
It was scary at the time. I'm really glad that I chose to
say that because resentment gets heavy and it corrodes trust and
it corrodes our relationships and we can build it up and carry
it for a really long time, but it will always get in the way.
So, another example, this is from my personal life.
I'm in the best relationship of my life.
If you follow me on Facebook, you have seen some of the
stories but it is truly unlike any relationship I've ever been
in because I am no longer trying to micromanage his feelings and
And right which often to like with boundaries.
Sometimes the thing that people tell me is I'm afraid to set a
boundary because I don't want to disappoint this person who means
a lot to me, and I don't want them to feel bad because
sometimes people receive a boundary as a rejection right or
as distance. Like, I'm not with you, but it
doesn't have to be like that. It actually can be a way of
creating more connection and Trust in our personal
relationships. Oops, too.
And one of the reasons why is when you have that Clarity for
yourself around boundaries that will also make you more safe.
Here's what I mean by that. So early in our dating I noticed
that I tended to text and message my guy a lot more often
than he did to me and it occurred to me that he might not
Not know what to do with that because if I like someone, I'm
just going to text you. I don't really really not good
at pacing myself. It's like how are you?
How was your day? What do you want to spend time
with me again? Do you want to hang out?
How about tomorrow? No.
How about the day after that? Like that is me.
And so what happened was is I realized oh, I'm messaging him a
lot. And so I talked with him and I
said, hey just so you know, I've noticed I tend to message you a
lot more than you message me and I'm actually super, okay with
that. So just you know, I'm not
expecting you to reply to every message.
I'm going to assume that if you don't reply, my assumption is
not that you're mad at me. My assumption is that you just
have things that you need to do and then you'll get to it later.
We're just going to bring that assumption and I just wanted to
tell you that's that's what I'm thinking.
Yeah, and he was like, okay and what super interesting is that
he ended up there was this time where he actually didn't respond
to me for like three days and then he came back and wrote and
he was like, I'm so sorry. You know I shouldn't have have
disappeared on you like that thinking.
Amy. I'm like he probably goes to be
got a little overwhelmed understandable and he came
message back, it's like I'm so sorry, you know, I shouldn't
have treated you that way and I said, oh wait no, I'm actually
Fine. Like I just assumed like you are
just taking time for yourself because you know, like you're an
introvert, I'm an introvert. Sometimes we like our alone
time, you know how you doing? How's it been?
And he was just like, oh, okay, yeah, good.
So in that sense the way boundary works when we're coming
to a boundary from love this sense of oh I'm actually I'm
really okay with how we are. Like I trust you to take time.
I'm when you need it because I don't know when your energy is
like getting depleted and you need to pull back to recharge
and I really like you and I want you to be good.
Like I want you to have what you need and it's actually better if
I'm not trying to guess it's actually works better.
If I just trust that you're going to stay connected to what
you need. And then you're going to, you
know, take care of yourself. And I'll do that for me too.
Right, I'll stay connected to what I need and I'll take care
of myself. So, for example, there have been
times when I said, hey, like, I had a really, really hard day.
You know, are you free tonight? Can we hang out?
And he has texted me and he said, I'm actually not available
to get together but I could FaceTime you a little bit later
if that's okay, or how about we meet tomorrow for coffee, right?
So again, like holding that connection to.
Where am I at? Like, what do I need?
Let me take love. Responsibility for that.
And from there, make a decision about what happens next and how
we're going to be together. And what's interesting.
Now, it's been like five years. We text each other probably
every day now just like freely. But again, there's not this
expectation of. Hey, if I messaged you, why
didn't you message me back? There's never that there's
always this kind of generosity of spirit, like, I'm assuming
you're taking care of yourself. And I also, To offer some like
simple language that can help you to convey a no with a lot of
kindness. A lot of love and a lot of
gentleness. So if someone that you care
about asks, for something of you, whether it's your time or
whether it's like, some something of you might be like,
somebody wants to borrow something that is really
precious to you. And, you know, it would help
them but you really don't feel comfortable releasing.
Seeing this beloved object to this person.
One of my favorite ways of saying no I am a gentle.
No to that I am a gentle. No, I had a friend of mine who
was coming to San Francisco. This was was this, this was like
mid pandemic, so maybe 20 21 or so and they said, hey, I'm going
to be in San Francisco. Co can I crash at your place?
And I thought about it and I was like, I am a gentle know I'm
really enjoying my solitude. I would love to see you while
you're here but that won't work. Gentle no helps to convey like
that sense of love and kindness and connection.
As opposed to the alternative of like, yes, you can come and I
will be secretly resentful and trying to hide it the entire
time, which becomes burdensome, it only works for so long.
I managed for 45 46 years, this new ways better.
So, starting to learn the language, right?
When you feel safer being connected to yourself?
What is it that I need? What is my agreement with me?
It can be around anything with what is my bedtime.
Like my agreement with myself is when I'm tired, I go to bed.
That's it right? Can be around work things it can
be around family. Things agreement with yourself
first and then offer the boundary from love with
connection. And when we do it early and
often it makes everything easier, I'll share one more
example that comes to mind because sometimes to is
boundaries. It doesn't require you to tell
anybody else what they are which is really nice because you're
not seeking. Science from someone, you're
simply making decisions for yourself that will affect the
relationship. So, I used to think that, when
my mom called I had to answer because that's what good
daughters. Do you answer the phone?
When your mom calls seems simple, right?
It's like yeah, you're like, yes, that's exactly what you do.
But one thing I noticed was that if I answered the phone, when I
was like, walking to the bus, or if I was not in a good mood,
then the version of me, My mom, got she got me feeling
impatient, kind of exasperated like yeah, what do you want?
I don't have much time, right? Like she did not get a really
great version of me. We did not have a great moment
when I show up in patient. And one day I realized, you
know, what, when I see the call incoming, I can send it to
voicemail. It doesn't mean, I don't love
her. It doesn't mean I don't want to
talk. With her, it just means that I'm
going to need a minute to kind of get into this space for us to
connect. I want to be present.
I want to be like the best version of me with her just
because that feels better to me. And I don't need to tell her
when to call me and not call me, I can just decide and then she
would call send it to voicemail. I've listened to the voicemail,
make sure everything's okay, no emergencies, right?
And then I could either just text back like, hey, Sigh you
called, I'm on the bus, you know, I'll ping you when I get
home or I could just let it sit until I felt like I was in a
place where I'm like, I feel ready to have a great
conversation with my mom and it made the relationship feel
better without having to give her any rules.
Hey, don't call me between now. And then just like, oh yeah,
like you just do you. I will take responsibility for
me. Like what?
I sometimes think of the opposite of boundaries is hoping
and coping like I I hope that everything goes the way.
I need it to go and if it doesn't I will just cope I will
just manage right as opposed to having a boundary which is 0.
I'm going to have some clarity about myself and I can
communicate that from a place that feels good hoping and
coping we can kind of do silently but it really doesn't
work on the long-term having Clarity with boundaries and
having boundaries with love is a much more sustainable practice.
Will require a little bit of a learning curve.
So we want to be aware of that so that you can practice and
start to feel good about it and then start to use them in all
kinds of situations, any questions.
Yeah, we see your hand. Go ahead.
Okay, so you mention like oftentimes the boundary doesn't
have to be straight like you have a rule like you know what
your bag, but it doesn't have to be stated.
So I'm thinking in the situation.
Ian where I'm like, always holidays?
I coming up. I'm always like the organizer of
big family events but I'm kind of like tired.
Like my yeah. So like so this Christmas is
like okay, I don't wanna organize anything, like come up
with whatever I like you guys want us to fight like I'm, you
know, whatever as so. Like, do you have a like a Of
saying that's because it's kind of weird to like I was just
like, gonna okay, how about? I just leave the group chat
goal, but it's kind of like that assumed coucher, right?
Which I kind of helped set up is that they are.
I feel like they're all looking at.
If you like to come come up with something.
And at that moment is like or do I like announce my boundary?
But is also kind of awkward. So like how like do you have any
what What are your thoughts around?
That is such a brilliant question.
I know you are not the only person who has stood like a
situation like that. So I'm very glad that you asked
that question. So, yes.
So the pattern in the past has been that.
You are the one to point. Do the, do the event planning
for the holidays, right? Yeah, yeah.
Take initiative proposed. Something like get people
together. Get people excited.
It's like I said, yeah. So now we've got a couple of
options one is and I love that you're thinking about this ahead
of time because there's kind of already a momentum where people
are just going to look to you like, but you always done that,
right? That's kind of a default
expectation but it's okay. We're going to drill.
We're going to do something new this year.
I'm going to do something new and especially because it's
still November, right? So this is the perfect time to
begin to notify people. That things will be different
this year. And I see a couple of options
for you. One is, you can think of it in
terms of passing the torch, right?
Like to the Next Generation or two including someone else and
be like, you know what, I've been the one that's typically
organized these things. I think this year, it is time to
hand that, you know, keep the tradition going and handing this
to somebody else. So you can do it either, kind of
like direct delegate. Jen like who I want to.
I want to nominate this person to do it.
You can think of it in terms of extending the tradition, like
it's now time for someone else to take the tradition.
You can also simply say, you know what, this year I am not
going to be available to do the planning and the getting people
excited. I'm not I'm not going to be
available for that. And you might say, either, just
like I am tired or you might just say you know what I really
want to invite Someone else to take over this year, I'm not
going to be available for that and it's like from this place of
love and realize, you know, people might feel like what's
happening, what is going on? That is not what happens.
The tradition is that you do it and you know, the response is
like not this year we're doing something new this year, it's
going to be great. I don't know what it's going to
be someone's going to do, it's not going to be me.
So bringing the The gentleness to it, offering yourself Grace
because you're the one who feels awkward first, right?
Nobody knows. Anything is different.
You're the one who feels awkward, you're like, what are
they going to do? What are they going to say?
So offer, some compassion to yourself, of course, it feels
weird. And also realizing, you know, of
course, people are very comfortable, letting you do it.
It's been wonderful for them. It really works for them to let
you do it and it's okay for things to change.
Yeah. I like the second option.
Yeah and it's yeah it's going to be initially a little bit
awkward but Just like, showing up with that love and gentleness
consistently in innate response I guess.
And not like go to the people-pleasing again and though
I would do some of like you know, like just sticking
sticking with it. It requires some sticking to us
while. So I don't like just be with
that awkward - I guess. Yeah, little bit initially.
Yeah, you can think. Gov it to like, growing pains,
like, when we're doing something new, it can feel awkward and
uncomfortable, but that's also like a sign of growth.
And it's something in this sense, you can think of it as
something that you are you are doing on behalf of your family,
right? Letting things change and be
different can actually be wonderful.
And actually I think oftentimes in families, we can get into
kind of a rat or a routine but when we become very Tensional
about handing, over responsibility, for about
changing, the expectations, and the roles.
We do that intentionally with a lot of love and that lets us do
it in a Cell much like easier gentle way.
Because the alternative is that we build up resentments until
the final straw and then it comes out in a way that feels
reactive and like not good, right?
So, it's so So helpful, when you get in front of it you can do it
with a lot of intention and Care.
Thank you. Thank you.
You're welcome. I also want to share that I do.
So I also work with people one-on-one on applying this
stuff in their life in their personal life, in their
professional life. I do have spots available
starting in January so if you want to talk with me about
working together, How that works, what that looks like all
the details. Then the next step is to book a
consultation which you can do from my website.
Kim nickel.com will find a link there to my calendar and you can
schedule a time. So we can talk about what's
going on with you and what we'll do together to get you to the
place where you're so much more comfortable and confident.
So I didn't want to share that with you as well.
Alright everybody thank you so much for being here with me.
Enjoy your boundaries use them With love and I will see you
later. Hey, before you go, if you like
this podcast, please leave a review.
Tell me why you listen and what has helped you?
Thanks so much. I'll see you next time.