Setting Healthy Boundaries To Thrive After Divorce

I'm sharing with you my interview with Nancy Levin! We will explore all about setting boundaries and putting yourself first! You must find your NO to free your YES. You get to know your non-negotiable and your boundaries. You realize your present moment choice predicts your future.

Transcript

Hello everybody and welcome to Thrive After Divorce.

My name is Lisa Fountain and I'm so excited for today.

We have Nancy Levin and this is,

I don't want to talk today because I want them to get so much of you.

But I have to tell everybody,

This moment,

However you feel out there,

When I was broken,

On the ground,

Couldn't get up,

Nancy was one of the people that reached a handout to me through her books,

Through her radio show.

And so I can have this moment right now with her.

You guys can find your moment too.

You can.

It's there.

You just have to take little baby steps.

But,

So I had to say that.

But to tell you,

In case you don't know,

Nancy Levin is the best-selling author of several books,

Including Jump and Your Life Will Appear,

Worthy,

And The New Relationship Blueprint.

She's a master interrogative coach and the creator of many in-depth coaching programs.

She guides clients to live life on their own terms and make themselves a priority.

Welcome,

Nancy.

Lisa,

Thank you for that beautiful introduction and I'm honored to be here and I'm grateful to have been one of your guides.

Oh,

You were.

And I've handed your book,

Your book Jump,

I've given to so many people.

Yeah.

So,

You know,

I know today we're going to talk about boundaries.

Woo.

It sounds sexy,

Right?

But they're really hard to have or know if it's even hard to know if you don't have them.

Yeah.

So,

I mean,

The bottom line is that most people don't we never learned.

We never learned about boundary setting and growing up,

We were most often on the other side.

You know,

As kids,

We were on the other side of hard and fast boundaries set by parents or by teachers or by some other authority figures in our lives.

So we never really grew into the awareness of how of where to find ourselves first and then be able to set boundaries from there.

So the first thing I'll say is that,

You know,

Boundaries is it's one of these buzzwords that goes around.

So I want to just sort of break it down.

And a boundary is simply a limit that we set around what we will or will not do.

Will or will not accept,

Will or will not tolerate.

So in order to be able to know our limits to set these boundaries,

We first have to really know what works for us and what doesn't work,

What our non-negotiables are.

And this is tricky because for now,

You know,

For most of us,

We've been in this place of thinking that a relationship works because we bend over backwards.

A relationship works because we abandon ourselves.

A relationship works because we do the thing of being in the loop of what do I need to do or say to make everything be OK.

Is that crazy?

It's crazy.

It's crazy.

But we do it.

Right.

So really what I want to say here first and foremost,

And I'm just going to shout it from the rooftop,

Is like,

I want to give you and everyone listening permission to put yourself first.

This is so counterintuitive,

But this is the bottom line.

Permission to put yourself first.

Because up till now,

Most of us haven't even given ourselves a seat at the table.

We've left ourselves out of the equation.

Everyone else gets the big juicy steak or big juicy tofu and we're taking the scraps and the crumbs.

And so it's really about bringing ourselves into the equation.

So I will often say,

You know,

So brief,

Not even going into my whole story,

But I was in an 18 year marriage and got divorced.

And I will often say that my marriage was a long time to be away from myself.

That is my favorite line that you say.

I love that.

Thank you.

Well,

It's true.

I completely lost myself and I thought that that's what being married meant.

I thought that's what being in a relationship meant.

But a relationship is not,

You know,

We can be deeply in love and not lose ourselves.

But the way to do that is to actually be anchored in the truth of who we are and knowing our wants,

Desires,

Needs and preferences and being able to speak them.

And that's boundaries.

And you know,

Or else I'm just thinking of my own self and people out there.

When you get divorced,

You have so much guilt and you lose boundaries as a parent.

Yeah.

Yep.

And so I think those boundaries,

It's still like the most loving relationship in your life.

But you talk about eating the crumbs.

Yeah.

And so,

Yeah.

And so the really big thing here is we're talking about boundaries is to understand what I will really call,

You know,

I mean,

This is really the secret to setting boundaries.

So listen up.

It's really understanding that we are the ones who cross our own boundaries.

So just let that sink in for a minute.

Wow.

So here's what's happening.

We set a boundary with someone and then inevitably,

Because I've coached thousands of clients through this,

Will say,

Oh,

I set the boundary,

But he or she just kept doing X,

Y,

Z.

They will keep doing X,

Y,

And Z because it's not up to them to honor or respect or uphold our boundary.

It's up to us.

Yes.

So the reason our boundaries are being crossed is that we're allowing them to be.

And so just let that be the guiding light here around the way that we take responsibility for what's happening.

So the truth of the matter is,

Like I just said,

The other people in our lives will keep doing the thing that they've always done.

They're not invested in us.

They're often not invested in our changes,

Especially the people with whom we're setting boundaries with.

So we have to make sure,

First and foremost,

That we're willing to stand behind the boundary we set.

Otherwise,

We're the little girl who cried wolf.

So this can,

And the other thing I want to say,

And especially when we're talking about kids,

Boundaries can be set with grace and love.

Boundaries don't need to be set from a space of conflict or confrontation.

They can really be set.

And the important thing here is to set boundaries from the place of I instead of you.

So not to make setting boundaries a blame game.

Not to start the setting of a boundary with you always or you never or you need to stop or you need to do.

It's coming back to I.

I notice that when you do or say X,

I feel Y.

I notice that when you criticize me at the gym,

I feel ashamed.

So what I'm going to do to take care of myself from here on out is go to the gym on my own.

And I'm not open to feedback about it anymore.

And then we have to stand in that.

And boundaries,

You know,

You your books from divorce to worthy yourself worth versus network.

But boundaries are so important in every aspect of your life.

Yes,

It's the it's a through line.

It's a through line.

And I love what you say and I believe it so true is that your present moment choice.

Yes.

Your future.

Yes.

Like that first time I heard that.

It took a minute,

But we what you're doing today.

Yes.

Creating your future.

Yes.

Because we if we look where we are right now,

Every choice action decision we've made up till now brought us here.

So therefore,

Every choice we make right now in the present moment is going to be creating the future that we're living into.

So I,

I,

I really do believe that our present moment choice is the crystal ball.

It is our present moment choice predicts the future.

And we have to really understand how powerful we are and how empowered we are around the choices we make.

And I think it's important to the key word in that to me is future.

Yeah.

You might not see an immediate result today,

But those boundaries you put up are going to be seen in your future,

Even if you don't see them right now.

That's right.

Because every single choice we make every choice is either going to serve the vision that we're holding for ourselves or sabotage the vision.

So for somebody that's thinking they don't even know where to start,

You know,

Like with boundaries,

Like,

Do I start with because divorce your whole world.

I know,

You know,

Like my in-laws with my ex.

Yeah.

So,

So the first place to begin is to take the attention off of anyone external.

Okay.

And to first start bringing the attention inward.

So for so before we can set a boundary,

We have to know what what is okay with us and what isn't.

We have to reconnect to our wants and our needs and our desires.

What I have found across the board in myself,

In my own experience and with thousands of clients I've coached is that that starting point is elusive.

What do I even want?

What's okay?

What am I willing to do or not do?

So the first,

The very beginning,

So,

You know,

The subtitle to jump in your life will appear is an inch by inch guide to making a major change.

So it's about the inch by inch.

So the first place that I like to begin the conversation around where to around how to set boundaries in the first place is checking first in with our knee jerk response when a request is made of our time or energy.

Most of us have the knee jerk response of yes.

And we say yes,

Most often from a place of I don't want someone else to feel disappointed or angry.

I don't want to engage in any kind of conflict or confrontation.

We also say yes because I want to show up as the hero.

I want to show up as the person who can do everything.

So we're saying yes for a variety of reasons.

And what I want to really underscore here is from here on out.

The invitation is to say yes from desire only.

Not from obligation,

Not from fear of conflict,

Not from fear of someone else being upset in any way.

Someone else's reaction to our truth is not our responsibility.

How someone else reacts to our truth is not our responsibility.

So we have to learn to start trusting our truth and naming it.

So the exercise I often give is for the next week,

Test drive this experiment of when a request comes at you for your time,

For your energy,

For you know whatever it might be.

That if you're ready to say no,

Say no.

If you're not ready to say no,

You can say I will get back to you tomorrow.

But you cannot say yes.

Because we need to build in some space to check in here.

Do I actually want to do this?

Is this a desire of mine?

What is the motivation for my knee jerk yes to this?

Am I saying yes to avoid confrontation?

Am I saying yes out of obligation?

We first,

We have to practice checking in with ourselves around what we really want.

Most of us have no idea what we want.

You know I heard you say that we've been so conditioned to being people pleasing.

Yes.

That you know it's no one's like maybe you've never even thought to stop and say do I even want to?

Right.

No.

And most people don't.

Like I was saying,

We just sort of go into the autopilot mode of saying yes.

And then we all know this experience,

Right?

You say yes to something and like five seconds later you're like how the hell do I get out of this now?

Right?

So we want to avoid the how the hell do I get out of this?

You get out of it by actually checking in with yourself around your yeses and your nos.

You have to find your no in order to free your yes.

Yes.

I love that sentence.

Yeah.

You have to find your no in order to free your yes.

So we want to start saying yes to the things that are really authentic desires and are coming from our own agency as opposed to in reaction to someone outside of us.

Do you think,

Because it's just been in my late 40s that I've started to like go I don't want to go.

I'm going to cancel.

And my friend that I'm canceling what loves me enough that she's going to respect it.

If you're surrounded by people that really love you.

Yes.

They they should go crazy on you if you have a boundary.

Yes.

And again,

It's not your responsibility to care take their reaction.

No.

So here's the other important piece here is around saying no or canceling.

And this is a big one.

So everyone listening.

I just want you to breathe while I say this.

It's a big one.

We don't owe anyone a reason or an explanation or an excuse.

For our no.

So we don't owe anyone an apology for our no.

So we're so used to making up a story or having a song and a dance or giving some reason,

You know,

Some Oh my God,

I've got to take my mother,

The doctor and my kid just broke a tooth and whatever,

You know,

We're so used to having to give some story.

And we don't a simple I'm not available for that.

Or thank you for the invitation.

I'm not able to join you.

Or,

You know,

My schedule has changed and I'm choosing not to do this right now.

Period.

You make it sound so lovely.

But you know,

It can be.

But that's what I want to say.

It can be it can be that lovely because we work ourselves up into a tizzy thinking we owe an explanation and we don't.

And in a crazy way,

Don't you think we put ourselves way too high on this pedestal that we give ourselves just power that somebody is going to be crushed.

Yeah,

I mean,

That's a really important point that,

You know,

The bottom line is everyone is actually so much more self involved and self absorbed in their own lives that,

You know,

Our yes or no doesn't make and break them the way that we project that it will.

And so,

Again,

This is a muscle we have to begin flexing we have to begin strengthening the muscle of being able to say no.

And just being able to leave it at that.

I will often,

I will often coach clients around really the less we say the better.

So like having that one line which I will often come back to by saying like that's your company line.

Thank you so much for the invitation.

I'm not available.

Period.

Done.

Please,

It won't be the same without you,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

And then our FOMO gets activated and you know the whole thing.

Checking back in here,

You know what,

It's really not what I want to do.

And then being able to say again,

Thank you so much for the invitation.

I'm not available for that.

Now what do you advise people since our audience today is probably just have gone through a divorce or getting a divorce,

You might be doing something for the first time with a person you've never done.

Yep.

Your ex-spouse.

You're going to get major resistance.

How do you coach them through that?

Yeah.

So,

You know,

What I would first say is to really check in,

And this is a tricky one,

And it's different if you have kids or don't have kids.

I'll say this.

I do not have children.

I have to be forthright about that.

And so it's a,

I know that divorce with kids is a different scenario.

However,

I also know because I've coached many clients through this that there are now,

That there are now apps,

There are now ways to involve third parties.

So that direct communication isn't absolutely necessary.

And I first really want you to consider,

Is direct communication between us necessary?

And if it isn't,

Then the boundary around that needs to be set,

First and foremost,

So that we're not constantly hooked in.

And I would say take it off of,

Take communication off of a way in which you normally communicate.

So take it off of texting so that you're not going to be sort of sucker punched by something coming up out of the blue in a space that you're often inhabiting.

So keep it,

Keep the communication in a separate,

In a separate space where you can go check it when you need to,

If it's not necessary.

If it is necessary,

Like if it's kids and schedules and you know,

Whatever amicable or not,

I can't think of the name,

But I know that there are actually a couple of apps right now that parents,

That co-parents can use to organize their kids' schedules without having to be in connection about anything else.

You know,

We use it,

The one I use is called the Family Wizard.

Great.

And it was a boundary I put up.

It's brilliant.

My,

I said I wouldn't speak about him,

But my ex-husband hates it,

But it's my boundary.

Great.

And I think it's amazing how many people give you pressure,

Like,

Oh,

You should always be able to co-parent.

Well,

Co-parent,

I say parallel parent.

Yeah.

Parallel.

Yep.

But no,

You don't have to have your phone.

No.

Or all those things and you're sitting at lunch or having to talk with you and then you're upset.

No,

You can just.

Right.

And that's,

That,

Exactly.

So that's what I'm saying.

Use,

There are so many communication apps nowadays,

Not just texting.

There are ways,

Whether parenting or not parenting,

You know,

That you can actually designate a specific app to communication if it needs to be there,

But not one that's going to constantly come at you.

We're in a space you're inhabiting.

And if you do not need to be in communication,

Like in my case,

We did not need to be in communication.

He wanted to be in communication.

The only way you could sort of keep his hooks in.

I had to draw the very,

The very clear boundary around.

I will,

I will.

It's not don't contact me.

It's I will,

I will not respond to anything I received from you.

And I think a word that sticking out to me that you're saying,

And so,

But need,

I think you have to check it.

Like,

Yep.

If it's a need.

There are certain things that are needs and needs to be addressed or responded to,

But other ones,

It's not a need.

Right.

If it's,

If it's,

If there's not a need and you know what we have to remember is that.

You know,

I'm going to,

I'm,

I'm.

I don't want to speak sort of in stereotypes,

But what's often the case here,

Especially for women is that we've been in a codependent relationship.

And we've been some version of.

The people pleaser,

The peacekeeper,

The don't rock the boat,

You know,

If we were going to talk about it in more sort of specific terms,

We could talk about it as like the narcissist and the empath.

Relationship,

Which I know is,

Is often the case for,

For most of us.

And so we're really still on some level.

Any,

Whenever we have,

Whenever we have that sense that,

Oh,

We need to still have communication.

It's because we still want to feel indispensable.

We want to still feel like we can fix or save or rescue or change.

We want to still believe,

Oh,

He or she can't live without us.

And so that's a really deep inquiry around being able to dissolve that piece.

You really have to look at yourself and see what you're getting out of it.

Deeply.

Yeah.

Because you have to look at that,

You know?

Yeah,

Exactly.

What's the benefit I'm getting by staying negative,

By staying hooked in?

It will most likely be negative,

But I think people would be amazed if they step back and think,

What charge do I get?

What am I addicted to?

Even if it's a negative one?

Yep.

You're still craving that,

That response.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Wow.

And I think that you said it in an interview,

I heard you,

That we become accustomed to being uncomfortable.

We want to,

That's a goal.

Oh,

Well,

I guess there's two different ways we can look at that.

One is,

So in one way it's that,

Yes,

We get so used to our,

Either our dissatisfaction or our discomfort,

We get complacent.

We don't want to make the change.

It seems easier to stay where we are than to make a change.

So that's one piece.

But then the other piece is also for us to start getting more comfortable with our discomfort.

Yeah.

To really check in around,

Around the discomfort we feel as we're making a change.

And then once you get to that point where you go from uncomfortable to strong,

Isn't that amazing?

It is amazing.

And to me,

I'll tell you,

It all comes back to being willing to take responsibility instead of blame.

Because we,

We really want to blame the other person.

We really want to make someone else the perpetrator.

We want to make someone,

We want,

We want to stay in the victim role.

We want to make it someone else's fault.

And we need to take responsibility for our part.

Now,

From all that you've seen,

How does that affect the other person?

What do they do when you stand up and just take ownership?

Because they're used to you blaming them or combating if you just own it.

What does that do?

Yeah.

So a couple things.

When it's,

I mean,

When,

When it's in a partnership that is,

That is wanting to stay together,

It,

It can inspire the other party to do the same.

However,

If it's in a party where there already is a contentious arrangement,

The other person isn't going to want to change,

You're changing the rules of engagement is what's happening.

They're not going to want to play along by new rules.

So there's going to,

There's going to be resistance.

There can be resistance either way in a relationship that's staying or relationship that's separating.

The difference is the mindset of people staying together,

You know,

Is the investment there.

But in the separating,

What really ends up happening is that by you making changes,

Getting stronger,

Speaking your mind,

Standing in your truth,

Anchoring in you,

You're really holding up a mirror to the other person so that they can see how much they're not changing,

How much they're not growing.

And it's very confronting.

That's right.

It's like the biggest power and you don't,

It's so.

Right.

But again,

What I would even say about this is how important it is to take the attention off of the other person in every way.

Because we're so wired to how are they going to react to this or how are they going to feel about this or what are they going to do or what's going to happen to them,

Some version of our attention going outward.

And so we really want to bring it back to ourselves.

And it's so true.

I know I can get like days ahead thinking well if I do this,

Then he's going to say that like you think,

You know,

But you're right if you just put it on you.

Yeah,

And I let me let me also just throw in the caveat here is I'm talking about,

You know,

So let me say I'm not talking about relationships where there is severe danger.

That's eminent.

So,

You know,

We throw around words these days like narcissism and abuse and all of it and I'm not saying it's not real,

But I'm not where I'm not talking about here where there's real where there's real physical danger emotional danger at risk.

I'm speaking more when we're talking about sort of the garden variety.

Yeah,

And I hope if anybody if you have those dangers.

Yeah.

Then that's right.

Right.

That's a whole that's that's that's yeah that's a whole different thing.

That's yeah that's police boundaries.

Exactly.

Well,

You.

You I swear you can put so much power in one sentence.

Thank you for just like the queen of making stringing together little words that create a movement of power.

Yeah,

Like jump in your life will appear.

That's it.

I know it take you have to get to the point where you're ready to do that jump.

Yeah,

You do are.

I would think jump and then put your boundaries up.

Yeah,

Yeah.

Yeah,

Right back,

Won't you.

What was that is that if you don't put those boundaries up you're going to end up right back where you jump from.

Yeah,

I mean if you don't if you don't put the boundaries up,

You're less likely to be able to hold yourself in the new right and that's a big part of this to to be able to first get a glimpse of who you are on the other side of this,

You know,

Really being able to connect,

You know,

Like I said,

You know,

In terms of the like where to begin.

It's like connecting with what do I want?

What do I need?

What do I desire and connecting with like,

What is your freedom?

What's your freedom?

See another amazing sentence that you have you must find your no to free your yes.

Yeah.

I'm thinking I know we're at the end of our time here but for a lot of people,

They might get resistance and actually hear people saying that's not you.

That's not how you think.

Mm hmm.

You have to be prepared for that and if you really know it's your new truth.

So it's probably not even your new truth.

That's probably the truth that has been nesting inside of you all along that's been whispering that you have chosen to ignore and it's screaming by now.

So it's the voice that told you as you were walking down the aisle to get married.

Don't you just say that?

Screaming for a while.

Yeah.

Yeah,

But it is,

You know,

We all have a series of red flags that we chose to ignore.

All the way up to when we to when we jump.

We've been ignoring a series of red flags.

So it's nothing new.

It's just that we're finally willing to listen.

Does it take a trigger like divorce or is it something with age,

What gets you to that point one day where you're just like,

I think it's something different for everyone.

I really do.

I think I don't know that there's a one thing across the board.

I think that we we each reach a stage where we're staying where we are is no longer more compelling.

Then,

Then taking the risk.

And now you brought a gift for everybody that.

You'll tell us about it because I'm curious,

What does your freedom feel like?

Yeah,

So it is an audio.

It's really so it's really a guided audio exercise and a self discovery worksheet.

I say give yourself 20-30 minutes with a nice yummy cup of coffee or tea or whatever.

And really start really start discovering what your freedom feels like because once you know that you're going to be able to make the choices that serve you instead of sabotage you.

Serve you instead of sabotage.

Yeah.

And we'll have the URL for that.

And then just for if anyone is new to your work,

I so recommend your books.

Thank you.

You're they're amazing.

And then also,

I don't know if I said it in the beginning,

I don't think I did,

But your Hay House radio show.

Thank you.

Yes.

Which,

You know,

I'm like,

It's free.

I can't write if you have to get the app or is it free.

It's free.

It's free.

You can download the house radio app or it's you can just go to Hay House radio dot com.

Yeah.

And there are certain ways like you can pay a little bit so that you can listen and have all the archives,

Things like that.

So it is free.

Yeah,

I can't remember because I've joined it.

And then I've listened to you so many times on it.

I do interviewing other people.

It is just it's an amazing,

Amazing radio show.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And thank you for being with us.

And I hope people are really going to take some time and think about maybe where they have boundaries and don't know it.

Where they need boundaries and how it can affect their life.

And I think it's a continual process.

We always are coming up with new new places that we have to have them or new people and their lives.

That's right.

It's a habit and skill that we just have to take on.

And there's no better teacher than you to teach us.

Thank you,

Lisa.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Have a wonderful day.

And this was an amazing moment.

So thank you,

Nancy.

You're welcome.

Bye.

And everyone come back tomorrow.

I forgot where you've been going to show.

OK,

Come back tomorrow.

We'll have another amazing guest for you.

Thank you,

Nancy.

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