Speaker 1: The Vaders say, when you protect your purpose, your purpose
Speaker 1: protects you. Most of us don't protect our purpose. We
Speaker 1: give it away for a person. Hey everyone, welcome back
Speaker 1: to Our Purpose, the number one health podcast in the world.
Speaker 1: Thanks to each and every one of you that come
Speaker 1: back every week to become happier, healthier, and more healed.
Speaker 1: I'm committed to those three things in my life, and
Speaker 1: I'm so grateful that you're committed to them too. I
Speaker 1: have been loving the stories on Instagram, the post on TikTok,
Speaker 1: so many of you are clipping the video episode off
Speaker 1: of YouTube. And I also want to thank you for
Speaker 1: all the incredible preorders we've had. We've had thousands of
Speaker 1: pre orders for eight Rules of Love, my new book,
Speaker 1: which is all about love and relationships and connection, about
Speaker 1: chemistry and compatibility. And if you haven't ordered it already,
Speaker 1: it mean the world to me. If you had to
Speaker 1: eight Rules of Love dot com and pre order the
Speaker 1: book because it makes a huge difference to authors, I
Speaker 1: would deeply, deeply appreciate it. And today's session is all
Speaker 1: about setting boundaries in relationships. Now, I just want to
Speaker 1: get a show of hands. How many of you struggle
Speaker 1: or have struggled in the past to set boundaries in relationships.
Speaker 1: Raise your hand right now and as you're driving, not
Speaker 1: wherever you are right now, right I'm guessing it's a
Speaker 1: lot of us. How many of you have said yes
Speaker 1: when you actually wanted to say no? You said yes
Speaker 1: to your partner. You're in people pleasing mode. You're in
Speaker 1: that phase where you just thought, oh, well, they'll like
Speaker 1: me more if I say yes, they'll keep me around.
Speaker 1: This won't end this way, they'll really be attracted to me.
Speaker 1: I'll just say yes even when I really don't feel
Speaker 1: comfortable doing whatever it is I'm going to see a yes.
Speaker 1: I want to avoid tension. I want to avoid stress, pressure,
Speaker 1: or conflict, and so I will go against my natural
Speaker 1: inclination and intuition to do something I don't want to
Speaker 1: do now. The opposite can also be true as a
Speaker 1: sign of not setting a healthy boundary. How many of
Speaker 1: you have said no when you actually want to say yes? Now?
Speaker 1: This is an interesting one because you're again maybe potentially
Speaker 1: acting out of a place of making the other person
Speaker 1: feel uncomfortable, making the other person work hard, making the
Speaker 1: other person feel like they're not ready yet, they're not
Speaker 1: valued yet. You're playing a game potentially. And again remember
Speaker 1: I'm saying it's you're saying no when you want to
Speaker 1: say yes. So there's a misaligned in where you are.
Speaker 1: Another way that we've all experienced or made the mistake
Speaker 1: of not setting boundaries is that we've expected our partners
Speaker 1: to know what we're thinking, to know what we want.
Speaker 1: We have not expressed what we would like. We have
Speaker 1: not been clear about what we would like, and we
Speaker 1: just expect them to know. Another way that I think
Speaker 1: a lot of people. My friend was just telling me
Speaker 1: this that we're not one of her boyfriend right now.
Speaker 1: He doesn't like it if she's out with her friends
Speaker 1: instead of being with him, even if he's out of
Speaker 1: town or traveling. He expects her to be on the
Speaker 1: phone with him or be connected to him at all
Speaker 1: times and doesn't let her have her own independence or
Speaker 1: have her own life. Now she's struggling to set a boundary.
Speaker 1: There where the boundary years, well, this is my alan time,
Speaker 1: this is my friend time, this is what I want
Speaker 1: to do as well, this is my personal space. And
Speaker 1: so we can start to see that we've caved on
Speaker 1: our boundaries for a long long time. We've made mistakes
Speaker 1: at either not even being aware of our boundaries and
Speaker 1: not even setting our boundaries, let alone expressing them right.
Speaker 1: So this is a three step process. First, we have
Speaker 1: to become aware of what boundaries we want to set,
Speaker 1: and you'll find that fifty percent of the boundaries you
Speaker 1: want to set are because of mistakes in past relationships.
Speaker 1: You crossed the boundary, you broke a boundary of yours
Speaker 1: that you didn't have awareness around. And now what I'd
Speaker 1: like you to do is reflect on some of your
Speaker 1: past relationships. Just like examples I shared a moment ago,
Speaker 1: what were the boundaries that you continue to cross, break
Speaker 1: and not live up to because you weren't aware of them.
Speaker 1: I had an ex girlfriend a long, long time ago,
Speaker 1: and I remember that after we'd go out for some reason,
Speaker 1: even though we had a great night, she'd always be
Speaker 1: upset and she'd go quiet, and then she wouldn't talk
Speaker 1: to me all the way home. And I remember trying
Speaker 1: to figure it out, and I'd be really understanding, and
Speaker 1: i'd be really loving, i'd be really supportive, and I'd
Speaker 1: do this every night we went out. And I always
Speaker 1: thought it was me. I was very young at this time,
Speaker 1: and I thought it was just completely me and I
Speaker 1: gave up the boundary. I was just constantly being a
Speaker 1: supporting person, I was constantly being empathetic, and I crossed
Speaker 1: my boundary where I wasn't having a good night anymore,
Speaker 1: but I was sacrificing having a good night where nothing
Speaker 1: had gone wrong because of how someone was behaving. Right,
Speaker 1: So now I'm aware of that, Right, that's an awareness point. Okay, Jay,
Speaker 1: that's a boundary that you've broken before. Let me think
Speaker 1: of another one. A boundary that I broke before was
Speaker 1: dating someone who always wanted me to travel up to them,
Speaker 1: but never wanted to come down to see me. Right,
Speaker 1: They never wanted to make the effort to travel in
Speaker 1: a long distance relationship to come and see me. Always
Speaker 1: wanted me to see them, and at the time, because
Speaker 1: I was into them, I would do that. I would
Speaker 1: take that long journey, I would make the effort, I
Speaker 1: would spend the money, only to realize that this didn't
Speaker 1: feel fair. Right now, what happens in this scenario, And
Speaker 1: I want you to reflect on your past relationships because
Speaker 1: I promise you it will save you a lot in
Speaker 1: your present relationship and if you have to your future
Speaker 1: relationships now how because what happens is when we're breaking
Speaker 1: our own boundaries, we often blame it on the other person.
Speaker 1: Now we never got the opportunity to blame it on
Speaker 1: our X, but now we blame our current partner. But
Speaker 1: really the challenges we are not aware of our boundaries,
Speaker 1: and so we are shifting our responsibility of that feeling,
Speaker 1: that emotion, how we want to be treated onto the
Speaker 1: other person. So first, I want you to just become
Speaker 1: aware of all your boundaries from the past and maybe
Speaker 1: some new ones that you've developed recently. And I'll be
Speaker 1: telling you the different areas, but I just want you
Speaker 1: to become aware of the ones from the past for now.
Speaker 1: What were boundaries that you broke, Maybe in regards to
Speaker 1: how you are spoken to, maybe in regards to how
Speaker 1: people talk to you and communicated with you. Maybe it
Speaker 1: was boundaries about what you were willing to do, your
Speaker 1: physical boundaries. What were things in the past that you
Speaker 1: know you've broken that need to be mended. So I
Speaker 1: want you to become aware first. Once you're aware of
Speaker 1: your boundaries, you then set them. What I mean by
Speaker 1: set them is that you clarify and articulate to yourself
Speaker 1: what your boundary is, for example, if I don't want
Speaker 1: to do something, I will say no and explain why.
Speaker 1: And I think this is a really important part to
Speaker 1: the boundary that a boundary doesn't just stop at yes
Speaker 1: or no. It has a component to it, which is
Speaker 1: why or how or when or what. It doesn't just
Speaker 1: stop at no, I won't do that. Yes I'll do that, right, Like,
Speaker 1: that's not a boundary. A boundary and a healthy relationship
Speaker 1: is setting a boundary that you know why it exists. So,
Speaker 1: for example, someone I know is aware that in the
Speaker 1: past they have gone to their partner for everything, so
Speaker 1: now they've set a boundary for themselves, which says, hey,
Speaker 1: I know who I go to advice for this thing. Right.
Speaker 1: So that's a great boundary that's been set where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to overburden or overwhelm my partner, but
Speaker 1: I know who I go to for this. Let me
Speaker 1: be aware of that, and now let me set that boundary. Right.
Speaker 1: Another boundary that I know someone in my life has
Speaker 1: is their desire to say, well, this is what happened
Speaker 1: before you and so my past. While I'm happy to
Speaker 1: share that with you, I'm not going to be made
Speaker 1: to feel bad about it, or I'm not going to
Speaker 1: be made to feel like I need to change it
Speaker 1: or that I need to become better because of it.
Speaker 1: It's what my past was, and you either accept that
Speaker 1: or you don't. Right, And now they are aware of
Speaker 1: that boundary and they've set that boundary. So after you
Speaker 1: become aware of a boundary, we have to set it
Speaker 1: and articulate it to ourselves and why it exists. So
Speaker 1: you may say, I don't want my past put into
Speaker 1: question because I have left my past behind, I have
Speaker 1: changed my habit, I have grown, and I don't want
Speaker 1: to be reminded of it. Right. Knowing that reasoning is healthy.
Speaker 1: And then the third step is expressing it to your partner. Now,
Speaker 1: this is where a lot of mistakes are made also
Speaker 1: because often the way we express our boundaries is that
Speaker 1: it's done in one of two ways. It's either presented defensively. Right,
Speaker 1: this is my boundary, this is just what I need, Like,
Speaker 1: this is just my way of taking care of myself.
Speaker 1: Like you don't know that, and you don't understand, and
Speaker 1: you know you are always trying to get me to
Speaker 1: break my boundaries. And this is my boundaries. So there's
Speaker 1: a sense of defense. One way of expressing your boundary
Speaker 1: is through defense, and what that does is that it
Speaker 1: assumes that your partner is malicious, controlling, or has that energy,
Speaker 1: and it now makes them feel defensive. So if you
Speaker 1: communicate something through the method of defense, it makes them
Speaker 1: feel like they need to attack because now they say, well,
Speaker 1: I'm not like that at all? Why are you assuming
Speaker 1: that about me? Right? So, you going on the defense
Speaker 1: in your expression of your boundary, even though you're just
Speaker 1: trying to communicate how you feel, has forced a sense
Speaker 1: of attack out of someone else. You see this in
Speaker 1: sport all the time. So why am I raising this?
Speaker 1: Because your boundary may be perfectly important, it may be
Speaker 1: perfectly valuable, but if you express it incoherently. Notice how
Speaker 1: I use the word incoherent and not incorrectly. There's no
Speaker 1: incorrect way when you're expressing a boundary, but there is
Speaker 1: an incoherent way in the sense that the other person
Speaker 1: doesn't get the opportunity to truly digest it. You can
Speaker 1: have made the best food in the world, but if
Speaker 1: you force someone to eat it quickly, you force someone
Speaker 1: to eat it all. At the same time, you force
Speaker 1: someone to eat it at a pace they're not comfortable
Speaker 1: with what ends up happening. They can't digest the food.
Speaker 1: So when you're expressing your boundary, I want you to
Speaker 1: do it in a very aligned way now and I'll
Speaker 1: express what that is to you in a second. Have
Speaker 1: you ever had one bad moment spoil your entire day
Speaker 1: or fell overwhelmed for no reason? What about stress or
Speaker 1: anxious over that big moment or difficult conversation. You should
Speaker 1: try meditation. And I know what you're thinking, Jay, you
Speaker 1: used to be a monk. I don't have time to
Speaker 1: sit in the woods for hours doing nothing but really
Speaker 1: all the time you need to start your own mindfulness
Speaker 1: practice is seven minutes a day with the daily jay
Speaker 1: my daily guided meditations on the car map. You don't
Speaker 1: need to close your eyes or find a special seat.
Speaker 1: You can try it while you brush your teeth, do
Speaker 1: the dishes, or walk your dog. My goal in seven
Speaker 1: minutes a day is to help you find a calm
Speaker 1: and feel grounded in your busy world. Plant beautiful intentions
Speaker 1: for an abundant life and simple steps for positive actions
Speaker 1: to get you closer to the life of your dreams.
Speaker 1: Here's what one of the listeners of the Daily J
Speaker 1: had to say about their meditation. Wow, I just had
Speaker 1: a super hard day at work and couldn't get my
Speaker 1: boss's comments out of my head. Then I did the
Speaker 1: Daily J which related to my work issues, opened my
Speaker 1: eyes at the end of the session and felt renewed again.
Speaker 1: Previously today would have destroyed my whole weekend meditate with
Speaker 1: me by going to Calm dot com forward slash jay
Speaker 1: to get forty percent of a Calm Premium membership. That's
Speaker 1: only forty two dollars for the whole year for daily
Speaker 1: guided meditations experienced the Daily J only on Calm. The
Speaker 1: second method we often take is instead of being defenses,
Speaker 1: we attack, right, We attack the other person and we say,
Speaker 1: you always make me break my boundaries. I've always had
Speaker 1: this boundary and you don't let me live up to it. Right,
Speaker 1: So there's that blame, there's that finger pointing. But you
Speaker 1: go on the sense of attack. Now, what does that do?
Speaker 1: It creates a sense of defense in that other person.
Speaker 1: The person now gets defensive and says, well, you don't
Speaker 1: understand me. I care about you. I just I feel
Speaker 1: like you don't listen to me. And again the point
Speaker 1: has been lost. How many times have you been in
Speaker 1: this situation where you have either communicated your boundaries based
Speaker 1: on defense or attack. So what I find here is
Speaker 1: so fascinating is that usually we go into attack or
Speaker 1: defense mode with our boundaries, But actually what a boundary
Speaker 1: is is a personal checking system of is this aligned
Speaker 1: with me? So Gandhi said that harmony or peace has
Speaker 1: achieved when what we think, when what we say and
Speaker 1: what we do is aligned. And a boundary is a
Speaker 1: boundary that you get to check with yourself of am
Speaker 1: I going or crossing this boundary. We think boundaries keep
Speaker 1: other people out. Boundaries keep us in check with ourselves.
Speaker 1: A boundary is not a barrier to keep someone far away.
Speaker 1: A boundary is a criteria that you check with yourself
Speaker 1: to not lose yourself, to not cross yourself. We think
Speaker 1: a boundary or is a barrier that stops someone else
Speaker 1: from crossing, but it actually stops us from letting anyone
Speaker 1: cross it. It stops us crossing it ourselves. That's what
Speaker 1: we're trying not to allow. So it's a safe space
Speaker 1: of reflection. That's what a boundary is. It provides a
Speaker 1: pause to reflect, It allows you to value who you
Speaker 1: currently are, before you decide who you're ready to be
Speaker 1: or not becoming who someone wants you to be. So,
Speaker 1: if someone's wanting you to become something, a boundary isn't
Speaker 1: a yes or a no. It's not accept or reject.
Speaker 1: It's a safe space where you get to ask the
Speaker 1: question is this aligned for me? Is this right for me?
Speaker 1: And then we can make a healthy decision before we
Speaker 1: lose who we are or become who someone else wants
Speaker 1: us to be. We get to choose right, We get
Speaker 1: to choose. And what I want to talk to you
Speaker 1: about now is I want to talk to you about
Speaker 1: the five types of boundaries that I really think it's
Speaker 1: healthy for each person to be aware of, to set,
Speaker 1: and to express. So we talked about the types of
Speaker 1: boundaries we've all broken. We talked about becoming aware of boundaries.
Speaker 1: We talked about setting boundaries. We talked about expressing boundaries.
Speaker 1: And when we express, we don't want to be attack
Speaker 1: or defense. We actually want to make sure it's about us.
Speaker 1: And now I want to share with you the five
Speaker 1: types of boundaries that I genuinely believe you need to
Speaker 1: be aware of, set, and express. And of course there's
Speaker 1: more so The first one is a friendship boundary. What
Speaker 1: I mean by this is often what happens in a
Speaker 1: relationship is we lose our friends as we move towards love. Right,
Speaker 1: everyone has that person in their group who gets so
Speaker 1: loved up that you never see them anymore and you're like, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think they're dating, I think they're happy, like we
Speaker 1: just don't see them around anymore. And what we find
Speaker 1: is that often that happens because one of the partners
Speaker 1: may be uncomfortable about you spending time with your friends.
Speaker 1: I used to have a friend who her boyfriend wasn't
Speaker 1: happy with her seeing other guy friends that she had
Speaker 1: from before she knew him. Now you have to ask
Speaker 1: yourself and reflect and have a genuine conversation with yourself
Speaker 1: around whether there needs to be a boundary set with
Speaker 1: certain friends, whether you are going to set them and
Speaker 1: how you express them to both people, or whether you're
Speaker 1: actually going to set a boundary for your newfound partner
Speaker 1: and say, well, these are friends that are important in
Speaker 1: my life and I have to see them, and I
Speaker 1: trust them, and I respect them, and I appreciate them,
Speaker 1: and I'd love for you to get to know them too.
Speaker 1: When it's the right time, And so friendship is really
Speaker 1: critical because often we find that people get envious, they
Speaker 1: get jealous, they get insecure, they feel uncertain about their
Speaker 1: position in your life. And if you've thought about this before,
Speaker 1: if you've become aware of it, you're more likely just
Speaker 1: going to avoidoid a lot of the issues that naturally
Speaker 1: come up in this area. The second one is what
Speaker 1: I call the ideas boundary. You may have certain ideas
Speaker 1: about life, and when you start dating someone, it's natural
Speaker 1: for you to be introduced to their ideas. And I
Speaker 1: think we again make the mistake of attack and defense.
Speaker 1: We either think that life is all about defending our
Speaker 1: ideas or attacking someone else's. Again, what I find here
Speaker 1: is that you want to be able to be influenced.
Speaker 1: You want to be able to be open to someone
Speaker 1: else's ideas. But if there's an idea that you've reflected
Speaker 1: one of yours, you've checked with yourself, and you can't
Speaker 1: seem to change your mind about it, you want to
Speaker 1: make that other person aware. But this goes both ways.
Speaker 1: You may also be with a partner who has an
Speaker 1: idea or an intellectual perspective that you may not like,
Speaker 1: and you have to respect their boundaries. So notice how
Speaker 1: boundaries work both ways. I think what we often want
Speaker 1: is a world where it's, well, these are my boundaries.
Speaker 1: I hope we keep to them. But then when your
Speaker 1: partner subconsciously expresses their boundaries, we can't deal with them
Speaker 1: because we don't like them, because they're not the same
Speaker 1: as ours. And chances are your boundaries are never going
Speaker 1: to be the same as your partners, and so we're
Speaker 1: trying to create an environment where they're allowed to have
Speaker 1: their ideas on certain things that are different to You're
Speaker 1: allowed to have your ideas that are different to theirs.
Speaker 1: But just as you want respect for your boundaries, there
Speaker 1: has to be a respect for theirs. Now. The third
Speaker 1: is a financial boundary. A financial boundaries how you choose
Speaker 1: to spend money, how you save, And this is where
Speaker 1: we actually have to lead to more open, healthy conversations
Speaker 1: when we get into a relationship, especially a committed relationship,
Speaker 1: about other people's relationship with money. So, first of all,
Speaker 1: I'm going to say, you should be aware of your
Speaker 1: relationship with money, and most people are not. We're not
Speaker 1: aware of how we want to save, invest or spend,
Speaker 1: or waste and knowing and these are the four areas.
Speaker 1: How much do you save every month, how much do
Speaker 1: you spend every month? How much do you invest every month?
Speaker 1: And how much do you waste every month? It's really
Speaker 1: important to categorize that, not to shame yourself, not to
Speaker 1: guilt yourself, but to gain awareness. So I want you
Speaker 1: to look at your bill this weekend, and I know
Speaker 1: it's going to be a painful activity, and I want
Speaker 1: you to audit based on how much money you had
Speaker 1: coming in, how much did you save, how much did
Speaker 1: you spend, how much did you invest, and how much
Speaker 1: did you waste. Now, when you do this activity, it's
Speaker 1: not to make you feel bad, it's to make you go, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: what do I want those numbers to look like next month?
Speaker 1: What do I want that to look like next year?
Speaker 1: If you do this activity by yourself, when you get
Speaker 1: into a relationship, you'll be able to show someone this.
Speaker 1: You'll be able to talk about it. Now that person
Speaker 1: may not have a model, but they'll say, wow, that's amazing.
Speaker 1: I should be doing that too. So what I find
Speaker 1: often is that we have a financial boundary that isn't clear.
Speaker 1: And because it's not clear for us, it can't be
Speaker 1: clear to others. This is the same with ideas. If
Speaker 1: we don't have well thought through, deeply meaningful understandings of
Speaker 1: why we do what we do and why we made
Speaker 1: that choice, it's very hard for someone else to also
Speaker 1: be able to understand that idea. So setting financial boundaries.
Speaker 1: The fourth one is an alone time boundary. How much
Speaker 1: alone time do you need every week? Some of you
Speaker 1: will say none at all, Right, you want to be
Speaker 1: around the other person, But it's so important that you
Speaker 1: have a loane time boundary set up. I know for
Speaker 1: me and my wife, I know that every week she
Speaker 1: loves spending time with her friends. I love spending time
Speaker 1: with my friends. She likes exercising with her friends. I
Speaker 1: like working out or playing sport with some of my friends.
Speaker 1: But recently I was talking to a friend and he
Speaker 1: was saying how his partner doesn't want to spend time
Speaker 1: the loan and she doesn't want him to have the
Speaker 1: time to spend alone either, And we start to see
Speaker 1: how that becomes extremely unhealthy and at the start of
Speaker 1: a relationship, we kind of like it sometimes that people
Speaker 1: like when someone's obsessed with them, people like when someone's
Speaker 1: really into them, And then after time, they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I need a loan time, but that person got too
Speaker 1: used to it. And I think this is the biggest
Speaker 1: challenge I see is that we allow our partners at
Speaker 1: the beginning of our relationships to get used to us
Speaker 1: in an abnormal way. They get used to us in
Speaker 1: a way that's not true to us because we position
Speaker 1: ourselves that way or we're more open, or we say
Speaker 1: yes more or we're more available, and then as time
Speaker 1: goes on. I found this with me and RADI, where
Speaker 1: when we first started dating, I was very available, and slowly, slowly, slowly,
Speaker 1: I got busier and she was like, well, wait a minute,
Speaker 1: what's going on here? Like you know, and that was
Speaker 1: busy because I was starting to work and I had
Speaker 1: to build my life. It was all very natural. But
Speaker 1: if I now was switching in that way, I would
Speaker 1: make her aware that hey, I'm going to be really
Speaker 1: available with this month, but then next month, I'm really
Speaker 1: busy with the work. And the fifth and final boundary
Speaker 1: is what I call a purpose boundary. The more you're
Speaker 1: aware of your purpose, the more you can set it,
Speaker 1: and the more you can express it to your partner,
Speaker 1: the healthier it is. Because what I find is that
Speaker 1: when you're moving in line with your purpose, it can
Speaker 1: be very unsettling for someone else because they feel second best,
Speaker 1: they don't feel as important. They maybe don't understand why
Speaker 1: it's so important to you. And when you don't set
Speaker 1: someone up with that insight early on, it just grates
Speaker 1: on them, like it just really takes away from them.
Speaker 1: And so when you create your purpose to help them
Speaker 1: become aware and for you to protect your purpose, the
Speaker 1: Vaders say, when you protect your purpose, your purpose protects you.
Speaker 1: Most of us don't protect our purpose. We give it
Speaker 1: away for a person, it's really important to think about.
Speaker 1: I want to thank you for listening to today's episode.
Speaker 1: I appreciate you so deeply. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: your time, your energy, your ears, and right now I
Speaker 1: am genuinely so grateful for all your amazing love for
Speaker 1: on Purpose. The guests had been incredible, these solos have
Speaker 1: been awesome. Thank you for your support and love. We're
Speaker 1: just getting started having an amazing day,