4 reasons why we women need embodied boundaries in our relationships
4 reasons why we women need embodied boundaries in our relationships, an article for the woman who wants to reconnect with her feminine power by learning the art of setting and upholding boundaries.
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Like a lot of us, you too must have heard about the concept of boundaries on the Internet, through your peers or in your self-development books.
What I understood from the courses I participated in, the books I read and the practitioners I followed early in my journey, was that boundaries meant knowing what I like or don’t like and letting people around me know that.
Except back then, forming a boundary felt like a guarding system that I had to ‘put up’ to protect myself. It felt like a constant effort-requiring act that needed to be ‘maintained’ by me every single time. At the end of which, I’d feel so exhausted that most often, I would either end that act of putting up that boundary OR try to simply avoid being in situations that needed me to hold that boundary.
What I didn’t know or rather had not learnt until then was that when a boundary is set up in the right way, it becomes life-generating not life-depleting.
What made my back then process of setting up a boundary so exhausting was the fact that I was setting the boundary first and embodying (more like trying to) it later.
This outside-in process wasn’t serving me. I would either start doubting my own self in that process or be always scared of practising that boundary.
It took me a long winding journey to learn that there indeed is an easier way to set and commit to our boundaries.
Something that is also known as healthy or embodied boundaries.
Maybe you already know what those are. Maybe what you know about boundaries is what matches the definition of disembodied (unhealthy) boundaries.
And while having an unhealthy or disembodied boundary is still much better than having no boundaries, for the sake of clarity, let’s first understand what distinguishes embodied boundaries from the opposite of it.
Boundaries by definition are personal rules or limits we create as a standard for interaction with other people/ situations.
The way we choose to interact with the world, and with the people in it, is largely defined by the boundaries we hold, and embody.
Boundaries also inform how we will respond if/when someone crosses those limits.
Our boundaries are a part of our essence, always pulsating, living, breathing in one way or the other. They’re constantly being fueled by our being, our heart, our standards and our preferences.
For us to be able to show up in our relationships as our authentic self, we need a set of boundaries to protect us in that process of sharing our beautiful vulnerabilities.
So let’s go a little deeper today and understand the 4 reasons why we need our own individual set of embodied boundaries if we want to show up in the world in our feminine radiance:
1. Boundaries help us define our unique identity (to ourselves and to the world).
When we don’t know who we are or what types of behaviours/ conditions/ experiences we desire to consent to, we become no one.
For us to know how we prefer to operate in this human world, we need to know what we like, what we don’t like, what we can say yes to, what we would like to say no to.
Similarly for a person to know you as/ for something, they need to know what is acceptable when they are around you, what is not acceptable when they are with you. If you haven’t done the work to figure out what works for you and what doesn’t, it would really not be fair to expect another being to respect your ‘undefined’ preferences.
We are all holding and embodying a boundary of some form at all times. Even an apparent ‘lack of boundaries’ is a boundary we are holding and embodying. Boundaries can be:
~ Healthy: creating an empowering sense of identity, rooted in love and compassion, further enhancing our integrity and generosity.
~ Unhealthy: creating a sense of depletion, rooted in wounding and resentment, enhancing undesirable (for us) quality/ qualities.
~ Absent: a sense of no direction or objective, depending on other’s preferences and standards (rather than embodying one’s own).
In absence of boundaries, we tend to develop unhealthy forms of attachment like codependency. Something that is not recommendable when it comes to the health of our relationships.
In order to fully actualise the vision you hold for yourself in different areas of your life, you need to clarify, create, embody and hold boundaries that serve you and help you thrive as the woman in that desirable version of you.
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2. Boundaries help us in our decision-making process.
Our boundaries have one of the following three orientations:
Yes
No
Still deciding
Where “still deciding” isn’t necessarily the same as maybe. Somewhere in between a yes and a no, it’s a choice we make when we are trying to avoid holding boundaries. It also means that we genuinely may not have an answer yet. Still deciding will lead to a yes, or a no, eventually.
Every single decision you make in your life is informed by your boundaries. And without clear boundaries, it becomes increasingly difficult to make decisions (and thus move forward) in the world.
For instance, reflect upon your current dating life and explore if you have clear answers to the following questions.
Are you available to be a texting buddy to your dating match(es)?
Do you feel comfortable having sex with a man who hasn’t offered you a solid commitment yet?
Would you be okay to date a man who doesn’t match one of your minimum standards yet but feels good to be around with?
The answer to all of these questions depends on the health of your boundaries.
Take some time out today to research in what part of your life, you’re in the ‘still deciding’ orientation. Drop into your heart and research the answers to all such questions and decide what it is that you truly would want to happen if anything was possible for you.
3. Embodied boundaries help us honour ourselves
Have you ever said yes, but meant no?
Have you ever left your intention unclear, undefined, unsaid?
or have you ever not fully asked for what you wanted?
Do you remember how that felt to your inner world? Not good, I’m guessing.
Every woman knows what it’s like to dishonour her boundaries as this is the part that inspires us to learn how to create healthy boundaries.
If you’re unable to form a clear yes/no based on your own existing set of boundaries, then the natural result is that you’ll dishonour yourself.
You’ll agree to going to a man’s house when you didn’t want to go to. You’ll agree to be penetrated when you are not prepared.
Each moment of dishonouring can lead to the build up of constrictions in our energy. Some may lead to shame, some may lead to a lot of buried pain and sadness, others may lead to resentment towards ourselves and the person who dishonoured us.
Experiences of such dishonour towards ourselves can leave us feeling rather powerless when actually we are immensely powerful beings.
When you learn how to embody your boundaries, it becomes so effortless and guilt free to be able to say no to what doesn’t serve you.
4. Boundaries help us eliminate resentment and birth compassion.
A lot of cultures around the globe perpetuate the belief that women are supposed to give first and take care of others first.
The same programming when fed to us in our formative years leads us to believe that we are ‘supposed’ to prioritise the needs of others before our own.
When we don’t speak up for what we want/need, when we let others walk over us, and when we don’t embody strong boundaries we may be giving from a place of lack, or self-sacrifice. We’ve been trained to think this is a noble thing to do, and that it makes us a good person.
But is that really true?
How do you feel when…
- a man you’ve just met tries to force his ideologies upon you?
- you give to a man your attention, time, energy in amounts that you very well know he hasn’t earned yet?
- you agree to sex but don’t want it?
Do you feel compassionate, generous, and inspired in those actions? Or do you feel resigned, resentful and angry at the end of it all?
One of the most common reasons behind why the health of our relationships, the romantic ones in particular, declines over time is the resentment that women build within them as a result of their over-giving nature.
In absence of boundaries around when and how much to give to a relationship, they end up feeling bitter and resentful of their partner.
Not to forget that this over-giving approach is a very masculine one to begin with.
And so when we create, hold and embody the boundaries that serve our emotional health, we are able to show up in the outside world with integrity, compassion and generosity, all of which align with our feminine power.
We learn to give from the overflow of our cup, not the depth of it.
There’s grace in our energy, there is honesty in our words and actions.
If you’re an empath/ sensitive woman like me, I can’t describe how uncomplicated your life will become once you start practicing this life-generating skill of setting embodied boundaries.
You’ll no longer have to succumb to being the nice girl to any and every person.
You can hold your ground and yet be the most generous and compassionate woman when you show up in the world. You can honour yourself by respecting your own boundaries and honour the person in front of you by practising radical honesty.
Your boundaries when embodied fuel your feminine power. A power that’s devoid of arrogance and is rooted in love and compassion.
A power state you were inherently assigned as a woman, one that may have been lost or forgotten on the way. One that can be regained, one that makes life so liveable, so much fun, so easy and so effortless.
Your boundaries are the simplest medium to channel that power in the 3D world we live in.
Whether it’s your dating life, your social interactions, your workplace relationships, your embodied boundaries help you- define your identity, make your decision making process unimaginably easier, honour yourself with utmost sincerity and eliminate resentment while birthing compassion in your heart for yourself and for the world.
journey deeper
If you’d like to learn the art of setting embodied boundaries, I invite you to explore my core feminine embodiment program, Your Magnetic Femininity.
In this deeply transformative course, I help you reconnect with the elements of your feminine power and use them to build an internal protection system that keeps you safe as you show up in the world in your feminine value of vulnerability.
You can learn more about its rich curriculum here.
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