Ever felt compelled to explain and over-explain why you gave a certain answer? How does it make you feel – empowered and fine or drained and unheard? Does this make you stand in truth or conform to what others want?
For me, it’s the latter and it’s never fun – it completely drains, frustrates, and makes me feel completely unappreciated/unseen. Communication is all about listening and responding, which includes asking and answering questions to eliminate confusion and misunderstandings. But there comes a time where no explanations are needed for your answers and it should stand as is. Some people try to take advantage of what you say (or don’t say) and manipulate or use it against what you stated as your truth.
Stand In Truth: YOUR Truth
We all need to realize when this situation happens. Once we realize it, that’s when we really need to reflect, evaluate, and make some necessary changes on what we can do. We need to make sure our no (and any other answer we give) stands in our truth and that we are comfortable and steadfast in our answer. Don’t let the negative reactions and hurtful words erase your truth everrr. Stand in your truth, revel in it! Know you are doing what’s best for you and that’s all that matters. You cannot change the actions, thoughts, or feelings of anyone else but yourself.
No matter who we allow in our lives, we have to respect ourselves enough to honor what we need and set boundaries around what we don’t need. While boundaries can be somewhat hard to create and implement, I highly recommend them. They teach others how to treat you and where your boundary line lies – no more of others overstepping into what you don’t want if you enforce those boundaries.
How to Establish Boundaries
Take this 3-step approach to ensure your no stands in your truth:
- Dive deep into self-reflection.
While we do need to set boundaries, we also need to be accountable to and for ourselves and the actions we make. Be unbiased and totally honest in your reflection, so you can find real issues and implement solutions. - Decide what needs to be implemented and write the boundaries.
Review your reflection notes and make them into a bullet point or numbered list of discomfort/issue standpoints you have – it can help quickly figure out those boundaries. From there, write boundaries that draw a line to protect you and provide relief. Here’s an example:
Issue: “I don’t have the capacity to listen to my friend’s constant problems multiple times each day.”
Boundary: I will limit the number of times per week I listen to my friend share her problems. - Have those difficult conversations and enforce those boundaries.
Now that you’ve reflected and evaluated, let’s put those communication skills into practice and execution.
Same Issue: “I don’t have the capacity to listen to my friend’s constant problems multiple times each day.”
Communicating the Boundary: When the friend comes to you to disclose her multiple stories, state the following sentence to implement your boundary: “I appreciate you continuing to share and entrust your stories with me, but I don’t have the capacity for a story right now…”
After this is stated, you can enter/say a timeframe in which you will be ready to listen or communicate if you don’t want the stories as frequently as they are, i.e. only wanting to hear them 2x a week.**
Please edit how you communicate the boundary as necessary.
Start Small
I want to see you take these steps and flourish. I know it’s not an overnight process, but small progress is better than no progress. Use these two statements as starting motivation to get your boundary-setting process in motion.
Even when your no isn’t enough for others, it’s definitely enough for you to stand in your truth. And no is a complete sentence. Period!
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