Learning

By Renee Heigel

So you have a hard time saying “no” huh?

You did a few things this week because you felt guilty and now you’re angry with yourself.

You complain that you get taken advantage of and people walk all over you…?

You find yourself, saying, “How can I not take that comment personally?”

Boundaries.

There was a pivotal moment for me where I began to see the emotional connection to my desires, specifically for food.

I was renting an office space on the top floor of this massive office complex for the marketing biz I was running at the time. There was a little restaurant, downstairs on the first floor. I often bought my lunch there and ate way too many spinach pies.

One morning when arriving to the office, I parked and just sat in my car. I couldn’t bring myself to go in. I was feeling sad, unmotivated, and stressed. I didn’t feel like I had any time for me and that people around me always wanted more, more, more. All of the thoughts in my head were shifted to what was going wrong in my life.

When I gained some composure, I went inside and started the day with some interviews to add some people to the team I had. When I finished and came out of one of the offices, I learned that someone had come in and stolen my laptop.

I felt like I got kicked while I was down.

I immediately went downstairs and bought candy, chips, cookies, and anything else I could find.

I slowly walked back up the flights of stairs with my items and sat down at my desk and began to eat, and it was in that moment that I learned what I was really doing with this “food.” I noticed a pattern. As I dove deeper into my salt and vinegar chips, I began to feel disgusted.

I made a spontaneous choice and threw away everything.

When I think back to that time in my life, especially as a woman, I felt driven, burned out, controlling, and uber-ambitious and determined. I didn’t say no, even when I wanted to. I didn’t want to disappoint anyone. I was also frustrated because I wasn’t getting the results I wanted despite my hard work.

Everything is energy, and when we are not prioritizing our energy, then that energy needs to go somewhere.

We end up internalizing it, and then it comes out in various ways: food, sugar, alcohol, relationships, shopping, work, drugs, and caffeine – you get the picture.

You relate to this, right?

You might already know that the extra weight you carry is symbolic of the safety you desire.

The amount you might immerse yourself in the tub of ice cream, relationships that are unhealthy or dependent, or your workaholic ways are often a reflection of seeking safety in something outside of you.

Your body reflects your ego.

Are you ready to let go of this?

Yes?

Toxic.

I was sitting in court this week fighting a traffic ticket (yes, I walked away with no points) and I overheard this woman next to me sharing with someone that she spent $2,500 on this curio cabinet to hold the 100+ ‘Precious Moment’ knick-knacks given to her that she absolutely loathes.

She said, “I hate those damn things, I spent thousands on something just to store crap in my home that I don’t even like. I felt like I had to…”

Sound familiar?

Self-sacrifice leads to resentment, guilt, anger, obligation, and more emotions. These are the biggest internal factors that destroy our health.

These are called internal toxins.

So many of us are in this cycle of over-achieving, controlling, and doing, and then building up a toxic overload because of it, and then going home to numb it all out with a glass of red wine and bowl of popcorn.

That’s not going to work for you and it didn’t work for me.

When in this self-sacrificing place, not only will you attract unhealthy relationships with needy, dependent people, but you will also continue the cycle and halt your capacity to learn from your experiences.

There is hope, please don’t fear.

It’s time to build up some more boundaries, internally.

You must figure out how much the situation is about you versus the other person, and then specifically learn to stand up for yourself.

I hear this often from my clients and readers…

– I don’t want to make any waves.

– I don’t like confrontation.

– It isn’t my personality to say how I feel.

You were likely not taught how to create boundaries as a child if this sounds like you. You are likely used to feeling guilt and dishing it out on occasion, and you must face the guilt directly.

How, you ask?

You must make yourself a priority.

“Good self-care is the single, most important aspect of our health, period.” ~ Dr. Christiane Northrop

Self-care includes not using food, work, substances, shopping, etc. to numb you. Please learn where you are channeling this extra masculine-feminine energy and channel it into self-love instead.

Self-care includes exploring practices of spirituality or awareness that allow you to feel safe without external stuff.

Self-care means learning the power of saying “no” and telling people your priorities are different right now. Saying “no” to someone else is really saying “yes” to yourself. This takes practice. Start now.

Self-care means seeking support from people who will help you put yourself on your priority list versus people who are enabling you because they have the same “boundary” stuff going on.

Take action.

Most of our energy is often spent hiding our true self.

Know that it may be time for you to establish stronger boundaries in your life that support you and allow you to evolve as a human being.

You must determine how much is about you and how much of it is about the other person.

Ask for help.

Learn to stand up for yourself. Practice, practice. A mirror works great at first.

Self care and creating boundaries is your responsibility.

It doesn’t matter what you learned as a child. Your adult self will flourish with boundaries and self-care.

These internal toxins are destroying your health, and I have a strong belief that you can heal them by letting them go.

Delight in yourself today by saying no to someone else.

I want to remind you of something:

– Yes, you’ll feel guilty at first.

– Yes, it will feel uncomfortable.

But here is the truth…

You will not be able to give the gifts that you are meant to give in this lifetime while you are feeling guilty, without any internal boundaries.

When you numb the guilt you are also numbing the joy.

I am here with you holding your hand along the way.

It’s time to step into your naked truth.

This is pivotal path in that journey.

Deep gratitude and love,

Renee
xo

As I headed to Albany, New York last week to film a 90 minute public television special, as well as 6 hours of additional DVD content that would be included as part of the PBS fundraising pledge package, I knew I was walking into a situation that was completely out of my comfort zone. I so wanted to feel like I was going to just nail it on that television set, that I would get it all perfectly right on my first try, that I would wow everyone with my professionalism and TV chops, that everyone would come to me later and say, “Lissa, you’re a natural!”

So I loaded myself up with expectations, hoping I’d get it right, wanting to impress my producers and please my publisher and all that jazz. Naturally, heaping myself with expectations of perfection only left me feeling stressed and overwhelmed in the months before the film date. And then, suddenly, I was backstage, about to appear before a live studio audience to deliver what I hoped would be a perfect performance. (No biggie.)

Permission To Be Imperfect

Suddenly, inside my head, I heard the soothing voice of Brené Brown (with whom I just did a free teleclass – you can listen to us here). When Brené was about to appear on Oprah’s Super Soul Sunday, she wrote herself a permission slip, which she hid in her pocket. The permission slip said, “Permission to be imperfect.” So right there, back in the wings, I wrote myself the same permission slip, and when I stood in front of that studio audience, I told everyone to bear with me because I was about to give an imperfect performance.

I then proceeded to royally flub up several times, stuttering over my words and misreading the teleprompter. Fortunately, the special was prerecorded! All I had to do when I screwed up was stop, admit my mistake, and try again. The audience had even been prepped so that if I said the same thing twice, they were supposed to pretend they were hearing my hopefully wise words for the very first time!

What If Life Had “Do Overs?”

After a few mistakes and do overs, I said to the audience, “Wouldn’t life be great if we were allowed to just pause and get a ‘Do over’ in other aspects of our life?” And then I realized I’ve done just that. I married imperfectly – twice – and I’ve now been with husband #3 for almost eleven years. (Do over! Do over!) I wound up unhappy in my job as a practicing physician, so I went through a massive career change. (Do over!) My health broke down because I wasn’t caring for my body or my mind, but I was blessed to get a do over in my health and am now down to half the dose of one of the seven medications I was once taking.

I have been pausing, admitting my mistakes, and doing life over again time after time! And this, I’m realizing, is one of the essential keys to a happy life.

The Pressure Of Perfection

Perfectionism can be a real joy killer. If I had been too afraid to appear imperfect, I might have stayed in two unhappy marriages or kept a job that was sucking the life out of me.

Perfectionism can also be a barrier to intimacy, as well as a potent form of self-sabotage. If I had been committed to trying to give a perfect performance in front of the live studio audience, I might have missed the chance to giggle and connect with the audience the way I did when I flubbed up my words and exposed my imperfections. They might have wrongly assumed that I had it all together, when the honest truth was that I was terrified to be doing something so far outside of my comfort zone. As soon as I let go of the expectation of perfection in myself, my whole body relaxed. I could be imperfect! And I would still be good enough…

I realize that’s what it really comes down to. When I’m too focused on being perfect, it’s usually because, deep in the shadows lies a basic lack of worthiness. Some part of me thinks that, if only I overdeliver, I’ll finally be good enough.

But beneath that shadowy part of myself lies something deeper, something more true, something I call my Inner Pilot Light, and that part of me know that I am – and YOU are – inherently worthy simply because we all have sparks of Divinity within us, and we don’t have to prove anything in order to earn that worth.

Excellence Or Perfectionism?

I notice in myself this struggle between the quest for excellence and the tug of perfectionism. Where is the line? How much striving for excellence is noble versus how much is just ego, rearing its overfluffed head?

Heading into the filming of this public television special, I was aware that, yes, the stakes were high. Yes, my publisher had invested a lot of money to produce this special. Yes, a lot of people will view it. And of course, I want to do a good job.

The same was true in my career as a doctor. A person’s life is on the line. The stakes are high. You don’t want your surgeon to be one of those medical school slackers who swears by the “C=MD” formula! But is it really necessary to push yourself to be top of your class like I did?

Here are my thoughts on how to tell the difference.

5 Tips For Avoiding Perfectionism

1. Give 90%.

90% of the pain of perfectionism comes from trying to eke out that last 10%, when 90% is pretty damn excellent.

2. Choose ease.

If you’re finding yourself pushing, striving, trying too hard, or if your work becomes burdensome, you feel the pressure piling on, and you’re in “fight-or-flight” all the time, you’re edging beyond the desire for excellence into perfectionism territory. As Christiane Northrup taught me, try being less sperm, more egg.

You’ll know you’re really in the flow when you’re doing great work, but it doesn’t feel like struggle, when you get winks from the Universe, things line up easily, and the quality of your work doesn’t suffer – you just didn’t have to suffer in order to achieve great things.

3. Know your inherent worthiness.

As long as we look outside ourselves for validation that we are enough, we will always be tempted to overdeliver. Try repeating affirmations that remind you that your value lies within. “I am more than enough.” Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

4. Send your Gremlin to time out.

There’s a voice in your head that can be a nasty bastard. I call it “The Gremlin,” and it’s the voice of your fearful, insecure inner critic. If you’re not maxing out your output, giving to the point of depletion (and for many of us, even then!) your Gremlins might be tempted to wage war.

Instead of letting your Gremlins get the best of you, listen to your Inner Pilot Light and know that you don’t need to be perfect. In fact, as Brené Brown teaches in The Gifts Of Imperfection, your imperfections are actually the gateway to intimacy, the way people can relate to you. Who can relate to anyone who never makes mistakes? (BO-RING!)

5. Set goals but release attachment to outcomes.

It’s one thing to set the goal of delivering a genius manuscript or a standing ovation performance or a gold star sales report or a successful surgical outcome or the desire to win the case/ land the client/ get the deal. It’s another to place your sense of value in how much you achieve.

Instead, do the best you can (well, 90% of your best) and then let it go. Trust. Have faith. And lean into your own sense of inherent worthiness.