Becoming Boundaried

You just wanted to feel safe (or at least safer than you would have been, had you NOT tried to keep them happy). 😞

Because children MUST look to the adults in their life to create needed safety and stability.

But when the grown-ups cause hurt, harshness, and harm (instead of love and safe connection), the child can only do one thing:

Survive. However they can. 💔

For many compassionate people, born with natural empathy and/or high-responsibility-drives, it makes sense that our nervous system decided fawning is a smart survival plan.

And, please hear me when I say this: THERE IS NO SHAME IN SURVIVING.

There is only compassion and honor here for you — honor for a child’s nervous system doing the very best it could in an impossible situation.

But, where does that leave us now?

Because for many of us, fawning feels like it’s become baked in — a chronic way of doing life and relationships.

Which causes us a number of problems, not the least of which is that our REAL self isn’t allowed to show up for our relationships…or our life. 😭

Because, when we are stuck in the fawn response, we gotta keep-the-people-pleased. 😵‍💫

Our fawn response WILL NOT LET US set boundaries (or have needs, think about what we want, or relax and experience inner peace).

Because it’s too busy making sure we SURVIVE.

This is the thing. Your nervous system has no choice. 💔

Which is to say, it can’t change this on its own.

But there is hope.

Because YOU have a choice.

And when we are ready, we can learn how to lovingly lead our nervous system home to ourselves.

This is what becoming boundaried is all about.

❤️
Molly

My friend Ingrid Clayton, PhD, author of the book Fawning, and I are hosting a live retreat together in California this October.

Come join other healers, helpers, givers, counselors, and empaths as we gather for a powerful time focusing on the voice wound, including rich inner work and experiential exercises to help you step more fully into your power.

Is this for you? Awaken Your Voice Retreat details are right here:
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Fawning is a survival behavior that causes us to…throw our boundaries out the window. 😫

If we even know what our boundaries are, that is (because most of us…don’t).

After all, can’t have healthy boundaries if you gotta keep-the-people-pleased. 😵‍💫

Can you relate to the fawning behavior in the cartoon I drew this morning?

⬇️ Let me know in the comments below if it’s hard to rest or relax.

(((You are not alone. More fawning cartoons to come over this next week - stay tuned)))

❤️
Molly

PS - if you are aware of what fawning is, I bet you’ve probably read my friend, Ingrid Clayton, PhD’s best-selling book, Fawning.

This October, Dr Ingrid and I are co-hosting a powerful live retreat in California!

The Awaken Your Voice 3-day Retreat is for compassionate people on the healing journey, ready to lovingly release the beliefs holding us back from stepping into the fullness of who we are here to be.

You are not here to play small, my friend. Join other healers, helpers, counselors, empaths, and people who care as we come together to move into our power.

In short, it’s gonna be EPIC!!!!! ❤️🔥🦋

Wanna come?
For details and a retreat flyer, visit:
https://boundaried.com/retreat 🌴

To me, signs of codependency & people-pleasing can be helpful symptom descriptors of the fawn response.

Fawning is a survival response that helps a person cope with being under threat of harm.

(My friend Ingrid Clayton, PhD wrote a fantastic book on this, btw).

Fawning causes us to prioritize other’s happiness over our own — which makes perfect sense, if you think about it.

In your difficult or abusive relationship, were you safe if they were in a bad mood?

No.🙁

See how fawning works to help you?

By fawning (keeping them happy, suppressing your own needs, and staying vigilant around their moods), you could better ensure your own safety and wellbeing.

At least for that moment.

But that’s the thing with fawning.

A viable tool in the moment, when it becomes a CHRONIC way of relating with others, we can never relax. 😵‍💫

Like in this cartoon I drew for you today.

What was a good survival strategy at one time ends up becoming a terrible “life”strategy.

Because it blocks us from being able to move fully into our own lives.

Why?

Well, when fawning is our primary coping mechanism, we never get to fully move into our own selves.

Fawning will help us survive, yes.

But it will unintentionally BLOCK us from thriving.

And that’s where becoming boundaried comes in to help.

My boundaries approach is predicated on the assumption that your current behaviors are not happening because you are broken or wrong.

(If you fawn, it’s for a reason — and it makes sense).

But also, until compassionate people like you and me become boundaried, we are doomed to stay stuck in our survival behaviors for life.

And that’s not what you’re here for, my friend.

Becoming boundaried is discovering how to come home to ourselves.

And that (speaking 100% from my own experience) changes everything. 🥰

❤️
Molly
Therapist-turned-boundaries-guide

For help with this right now, my minicourse is here for you. There’s a powerful quiz inside (and it’s totally free).

Register here and get it instantly:
Https://boundaried.com/breakthrough 🦋

Under pressure to keep-the-people-pleased, we compassionate folks have been taught NOT to trust our intuition.

Perform, perform, perform, right? 😵‍💫

Trained to jump through the hoops (to make everybody happy), it can be hard to find the courage to stop.

To pause and listen to our intuition.
To wait until a decision feels right.

And some people (red flag) exploit this further by pushing aggressively to get their way — making demands on you, appealing to your love and compassion as a means to extract more energy from you.

You’ve given so much, right?
Why not give a little more?

Yet your intuition tells you to wait.
You feel hesitant, unsure.

It takes inner strength to say,
“No, not yet. I don’t feel comfortable making a decision at this time.”

It takes self-respect to say,
“I will honor my intuition by taking the time I need to decide which decision is right for me.”

But this is what becoming boundaried looks like.

We are growing in the art of honoring our own inner process, respecting our needs and our timing.

If you feel hesitant about something right now, may these words speak peace to your heart.

You can give yourself permission to pause.

Take some time to yourself and journal, draw, or meditate on what is giving you pause.

There is great wisdom inside of you.

Listen to it. ✨

❤️
Molly
Therapist-turned-boundaries-guide

Shame causes us to shrink. 🥀
Self-compassion helps us learn. 🌱

When you self-reflect, do so from the energy of self-compassion and watch how beautifully you grow.

❤️
Molly
Therapist-turned-boundaries-guide

Now is a beautiful space
Brimming with power,
Pregnant with possibility.

Step out of yesterday.
That isn’t you anymore.

Join me Here in Now.
Let’s see what we can do. ✨

❤️
Molly

Codependency is NOT WHO YOU ARE. Read on:

For compassionate people, codependency can be a useful term to describe a cluster of symptoms.

YOU are not a cluster of symptoms.

(Read that again).

Codependency does not define you.

But if you are a compassionate person, you may have a cluster of codependent symptoms.

Symptoms that probably cause a lot of problems. 😩

Those symptoms often have an underlying cause, such as:

❤️‍🩹 attachment wounds

❤️‍🩹 trauma-induced fawn response

❤️‍🩹 growing up as a compassionate person in a world that does not promote compassion but instead promotes self-centeredness and lack of empathy (so we reject that)

❤️‍🩹 we were never taught what our true boundaries were, so our compassionate gifts became over-extended, mistreated, or used unsustainably

❤️‍🩹 or all of the above.

So in this hand-drawn cartoon series I’ve done on codependency, please use it in the ways that would be helpful to you, but DO NOT make the mistake of identifying yourself as a pathology.

You are not a pathology.

There is nothing wrong with you for coming up with adaptive coping mechanisms to try to figure out confusing, scary, or hurtful relationships.

You are not broken.

You are a beautiful compassionate human who has been doing their best.

And now you know more than you did before. Now you have access to resources that you didn’t have before.

So now we can change this.

(((And it doesn’t have to be hard.)))

Becoming boundaried is the way out of the codependency.

The symptoms that once helped get your needs met no longer serve you.

You deserve better.

❤️
Molly

My Boundaries 101 class is NOT your typical boundaries class. Come learn a radically different approach to boundaries that is built for the exact needs of compassionate people.

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For compassionate people (loyal, empathic, other-centered, and caring), it’s easy to get lost in someone else.

Especially easy when so many toxic movies, songs, and stories from childhood taught us we’re only 50% of a person if single — that being in a relationship is what makes you a whole person. 🙄

No WONDER it’s so easy to lose our identity in a relationship and fall into codependent patterns.

It’s like we were practically trained to become that way.

BECAUSE WE WERE. 😳

But it gets worse.

Because if the relationship becomes toxic, troubled, or abusive, our codependent patterns keep us hopelessly stuck (like in this cartoon that I drew). 💔

Hear me on this: we are NOT trying to be codependent.

We’re just trying to save our relationship — because that’s the only way we know how to save ourselves.

So what can we do?

The answer to this mess is simple:

We need to discover our boundaries.

Because the truth is, you are NOT your relationship.

Can your relationship be saved?

Maybe.

Some can. Some can’t. (As you discover your boundaries, you’ll figure out what’s best for your relationship).

But YOU, my friend, can be.

Because you are you. ✨

Not your relationship. Not the toxic behavior. Not the confusion.

You. Pure. Beautiful. And full of innate worth.

That’s a boundary.

❤️
Molly
Therapist-turned-boundaries-guide

For help with this, come take the quiz.
It’s inside my free boundaries minicourse.
Get it here:

Https://boundaried.com/breakthrough 🦋

When our loyalty is unboundaried, codependent dynamics usually follow.

NOT because we WANT that, mind you, but simply because THAT’S WHAT HAPPENS when loving people don’t know where the boundaries are. 😣

And how can we know where the boundaries are when no one has ever shown us?

We think love is supposed to be unconditional…

So it makes sense then, when in a difficult or toxic relationship, we often try to love harder in order to make things work.

Isn’t love the answer?

Before long, we may even find ourselves sacrificing our dignity and self-respect in trying to make things work.

“If I can just contort myself into the way they want me to be, lower my standards, and not require emotional safety, then this relationship can work…right?” 😵‍💫

Some might call this a symptom of codependency.

Others may use attachment styles to explain it, or the abuse cycle, trauma bonding, survival strategies, etc, and still others see it within the lens of fawning, such as can be caused by complex trauma.

Please note: ALL of those terms can be correct, btw, especially in their context.

In fact, for some of us, it’s truly a case of, “all of the above.” ❤️‍🩹

The point of the cartoons in this codependency series I’ve been drawing this past week is not so much to focus on the term “codependency.”

(In fact, I prefer you use the term that is most helpful to you and best fits your context).

I simply use the word because it’s a good catch-all for these common symptoms, helping us to identify behaviors and dynamics that many compassionate folks have been conditioned to believe are normal.

I want to DE-NORMALIZE these dynamics.

Because they shouldn’t be our normal. 😭

I want to show you the COST of living life this way — to help compassionate people see how our boundaries confusion is costing us our wellbeing (on almost every single level). 😩

Because you deserve better. ❤️

A couple caveats are in order:

No, you are NOT responsible for their abusive behavior. That’s 100% on them.

((((The abuse is not your fault.)))))

Yes, the other person DOES need to change. Ideally, anyways.

Because being abusive or hurtful isn’t good for them (or anyone around them).

But … will they change?

Here’s where boundaries bring us clarity and direction.

We can’t make them do what they’re not ready or willing (or able yet) to do.

It’s time to accept that.

Contorting yourself, lowering your standards, or letting yourself remain in an environment that causes you harm is NOT helping them change.

That’s a boundary.

But I do know someone who CAN change.

YOU. ❤️

You don’t have to stay locked into this miserable cycle.

Change is possible. 🦋

And boundaries are the way.

Becoming boundaried is the way home to ourselves.

“Isn’t love unconditional?”

Yes…

But your adult relationships are NOT.

You can love someone and let them go.

(Safely. When able, as able).

That’s a boundary, too.

❤️
Molly
Therapist turned boundaries guide

Want to go deeper with this (and get practical help now)?

My boundaries mini-course is free.

Get it here:
Https://boundaried.com/breakthrough ✨

PS - An important safety caveat.
If someone is violent or threatens your life or wellbeing, or you have reason to believe you could be in danger if they knew you were leaving, please do NOT tell them about your plans to leave or attempt to set new boundaries with them. Abusive or violent individuals can react to their victims empowerment with worsened violence (which can be deadly). Before taking action, if you are concerned for your safety, trust your instincts and find a domestic violence counselor or trained specialist and create an individualized safety plan. (There are also a variety of free hotlines that can help point you to area resources). Your safety is boundary number one. You are worth it. 💕

Talk about confusing! Isn’t caring about others what good people are supposed to do? 🥴

Yet our loving compassionate hearts can quickly cross the line into codependent behaviors.

And codependent behaviors, especially over time, have a disastrous impact on our lives. 😩

When does being kind to others cross boundary lines, anyways?

And how are we supposed to know where the boundary lines are (especially when no one ever told us)? 😵‍💫

And let’s not forget the impact of trauma on all of this, too.

Some of us grew up in households where keeping-the-people-pleased was important for our safety. 💔

So we learned to fawn (a survival strategy which causes symptoms that can look just like codependency).

This can happen to us in adulthood, too. 😮‍💨

Abusive relationships, high-control religion, systemic injustice, toxic workplaces, etc, ALL require the people within them to learn how to disassociate from their emotions, wants, and needs in order to stay safe.

Which opens the door wide to codependent or fawning behaviors becoming normalized, taught, expected, even demanded of us.

So, however we might come by this problem, the facts are clear:

WE DON’T WANT TO BEHAVE IN CODEPENDENT WAYS.

Yet many of us have been conditioned to be exactly that.

And as much as we may hate it, we also don’t know how to stop. 😵‍💫

We are miserable, hurting, and exhausted.

What is the answer?

Boundaries.

Pro-relational, loving, honor-based boundaries are the beautiful antidote to codependent behaviors.

There’s a reason I (and soooo many of my clients) say that becoming boundaried is life-changing. 🦋

And it might be easier than you think.

You deserve better, my friend — and change is possible.

I’m living proof.

❤️
Molly
Therapist-turned-boundaries-guide

PS - Want help?

My boundaries breakthrough minicourse is a beautiful place to begin (and it’s free).

Take the quiz.
Get help.
See you inside. ⬇️
Https:/boundaried.combreakthrough