Boundaries & the Block Button

We talk a lot about setting boundaries, but what about keeping them? In this episode of Inside Out, Jojo gets honest about the boundaries she sets with herself and others, where they slip, and the uncomfortable question that changed how she sees the whole thing. From late-night scrolling to the family questions that never stop to the person who just won't take the hint, this one might hit a little close to home. If you've ever felt like your "no" isn't landing, or like you keep giving yourself away, press play.

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Transcript

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Welcome to the Inside Out Podcast. I'm your host, Jojo, and this is where we will navigate the mess together. That is mental, emotional, and spiritual. Let's get into it. Hi everyone. Happy Wednesday. Hope you're having a great week. So this week is going to be a topic that I think a lot of people will have some thoughts about. And it is on boundaries. How many of us feel like we don't have strong enough boundaries? Is that with your partner? Is that with yourself? Is that with your family? Where do you feel like you are lacking boundaries in your life? Lately, I've associated boundaries, my own internal boundaries, with noticing where I self-betray. Because I set a boundary and then I cross that boundary with myself, whether that's just the time that I need to spend doing work on this podcast or on self-care or just space from the outside world because life is crazy and sometimes I just need to quiet my mind, but instead I don't keep that boundary firm enough with myself and I'll turn on Netflix. So think about for a second where in your life your boundaries aren't very solid. Is it even just like when you're scrolling on TikTok in bed at night before you fall asleep? Is the boundary that you need to create, like, oh, I actually need to leave my phone in my kitchen. That's a boundary I created with myself because I was not strong enough to not pick up my phone in the middle of the night if I couldn't sleep. But now there's no way I'm gonna get out of bed when I'm super toasty and warm and then go pick up my phone. But some of us lay there for hours and we don't get enough sleep at night because that boundary is not firm enough within ourselves. So maybe this is external. Maybe your boundaries aren't firm enough with your family. Maybe they're constantly questioning you like, when are you gonna have kids? Or when are you gonna get married? Or when are you gonna get a job? When's that promotion coming? Are there boundaries that you need to set with other people? So I thought this was very interesting because someone explained this to me this way once that boundaries are like bumpers that we apply to our lives, right? And typically it starts from us realizing something that doesn't work for us internally, and then we make a change externally that ripples out into our life. It's like water in a container. It needs to be contained. We need to keep our energy contained so it's not going everywhere, so it's not flowing out and spilling out all over the kitchen. If you're pouring a glass of water, that's the container. The same thing with our energy and how we apply that to our lives. And maybe that container is putting my phone away and not scrolling for hours and not self-betraying because I need to go to sleep at night and keeping that boundary really firm with myself so that I get a good eight hours. When I started to implement boundaries, I started to realize that it's not about saying no to the external world. It's about saying yes to myself because I might want to go out and meet up with friends on a Saturday night, but I know that I have to be up early for whatever it is on Sunday morning. And typically it's like a workout class, or I just want to have a full eight hours and I want to be proficient in my day and productive and get stuff done and not be hung over or whatever it is. So it's not that I'm saying, oh no, I'm not gonna meet up with you guys. Like, yes, it is actually saying that. But if you flip it, it's saying yes to the things and the productivity that I need to have in my day so that I am more productive for myself. The busier I get, I've started to feel not FOMO, but a guilt to an extent of I can't be saying yes to everyone because I need to say yes to me. I can't be calling people back when they call me or giving my time away so freely like I used to. If someone's like, hey, let's make plans this night, where in the past I would have been like, yeah, sure, but at the cost of me not having time to do the things that I actually need to get done for my deadlines, even if that is an early workout in the morning or what, whatever, you guys get the point. And it's really about shifting that and being like, yeah, I might be saying no to one night out or instilling these boundaries. But at the end of the day, I'm pushing forward what I really need to be doing. And I've talked about this in the previous episode where our energy gets dispersed because we're not specific about where we spend our time. And if we're constantly just saying yes and doing this and going there and like going with the flow of like what everyone else is doing, and it doesn't align with like the things that we really need to be actualizing in our life. Maybe that's studying, maybe that's an exam, maybe that's a certification, maybe that's saving money for a trip, maybe that's building out your business, maybe that's getting healthier in your body, in your mindset, the people you spend your time with. But boundaries are the thing that we can really instill in order to change our lives, right? Now you might be thinking, well, I set a boundary with someone, but they keep crossing my boundary. That's happened to me so many times. There's someone in my life that I have set a very specific boundary with, and they keep crossing that boundary. They keep doing exactly what I've said not to do. And I've made it very clear that X, Y, and Z needs to happen and it doesn't, but they still keep disrespecting said boundary. And that's something I actually realize that I have to look at within myself. Because it's not that they just keep crossing my boundary, it's that I keep letting them cross my boundary. Now we realize that when we have boundaries with ourselves and then we self-betray and go against the boundary that we set with ourselves, whether that's I'm only gonna have one chocolate tonight and we end up eating the entire box, or I'm gonna go to bed at 10 o'clock tonight and then we end up staying scrolling on our phone until midnight. The same thing applies externally. When someone keeps crossing our boundaries, it's because we let them. It's because our boundaries are not firm enough. Now let that sink in for a second. What do I mean that they're not firm enough? Will you keep letting them cross your boundary? Right? Oh, well, they just like keep doing blah, blah, blah, and I keep saying this, and it just keeps going and going and going. Remember back to that episode that I talked about if you say you have 15 minutes on the phone and they take 20, well, it's your job at 15 minutes to be like, I'm sorry, that's all the time I had for you. It's time to hang up the phone and click, it's off. You have to be strong enough in yourself and your values and what you really want in order to instill these boundaries, because this person will keep crossing my boundaries because I keep letting them, because I keep perpetuating the cycle, whether that's responding or trying to see if there's another way to go about something. But at the end of the day, you can block that person. Like, let's say it's an ex that keeps like reaching out to you and you're like, they just keep disrespecting my boundary. When I've said, I don't want to hear from you. Well, you can block that person, right? Like that's an easy thing. And there's something that's really funny about the block button. While I was having this conversation with someone about the block button, they told me something funny. They were like, Okay, but it's like having chocolate cake in the house. Are you just someone who can never have chocolate cake in the house? Or are you someone who's strong enough to have chocolate cake in the house and just not eat it? And I was like, oh damn. So basically that meaning, if I block this person, I'm not actually dealing with creating that boundary. Because then what? One day I unblock them and then we're back in the loop. No. You have to be super strong in yourself and say, either instill the boundary and just let that gnat just die off at some point, or keep self-betraying. Or if it gets really bad, now there's a difference when it's a very toxic situation. You have to block someone, like for sure, hit that block button. There are different circumstances out there where you're probably never gonna unblock this person. But for the sake of if someone keeps crossing your boundary, just look at yourself because there's a high probability that the reality is that you keep letting them. So let's get messy. Mentally, protect your mental space, whatever that is. If you need to say no, say no. If you need to prioritize certain things, make sure you are getting really clear on what it is that you need because then you're gonna be less stressed, you're gonna be having a way less cluttered life, and things are gonna feel a little bit more manageable emotionally. Having boundaries really does protect you and prevents you from having emotional exhaustion or resentment or any of these things that can burn us out. If you set a limit with that person that's calling you, then you are taking care of your own emotional well-being and not overextending yourself. Spiritually, if you're aligning yourself with the boundaries that you are setting, overall, you're just gonna be way less drained. And you're gonna have so much more availability for your own self. Thank you for going inside out with me this week. Don't forget to share this with a friend. Like, subscribe wherever you listen to your podcast. Follow along on Instagram at underscore insideout.podcast, and I'll see you guys next week. Bye.