 Note: This article was originally published on "The Anti Hustle Project". When I first joined Instagram, I came across some ads about growing my social media following and building my list, directing me to "get 10,000 followers now!" The ads usually featured women with a trendy yet relatable vibe, and I’ll admit it – I clicked. Getting 10,000 followers was appealing on some level, and if other women in the helping field were doing it, maybe I could too. I even signed up for a free webinar on growing my list. As a result of that one click, IG started showing me more of those types of ads, some of which I’d pause upon, until before long those were all the ads I saw. And the result? It absolutely made me feel not enough. I felt more anxious and caught up in getting likes than I ever had. After that initial click, I probably had 2-3 solid weeks of staying up late, sitting on my phone, liking and following account after account on IG. It’s not that I was spending more than an hour or so in a day. But when you run a business and have a rambunctious 3-year old, there aren’t many hours in a day to work with. When all of my “Nicole time” was taken up with trying to get more followers, it really did have an impact. I was ignoring my body (it wanted to move!) my heart (it wanted to connect) and my mind (it wanted to read). And each night I’d slide into bed a little more tired and a little more hopeless about the mountain in front of me. The worst part was how anxious and unsatisfied I felt. This really threw me because I’ve done a lot of work on self worth. I make a point of not exposing myself to advertisement and staying out of the comparison trap. I’ve moved away from spaces and people who make me feel insecure and moved toward those that embrace me in all of my humanness. It’s sometimes strange to say it out loud, but I really like who I am and the work that I’m doing. I absolutely still make mistakes and know I have a lot to learn, but at the core I’m pretty solid. Of course, it was no real surprise that when I was constantly exposed to this messaging, it got harder to scroll on by. I got caught up. But it was so not like me to feel this way that I had to take a second look and really think about what I was doing. I know for some industries, having a strong platform and following might be important. I was definitely feeling the pressure of getting thousands of followers, but did I need thousands of followers? Honestly, for me at that point, no. I have a full practice and a strong local community. So why was I feeling like what I was doing wasn’t enough? I blame hustle culture. Hustle culture goes beyond simply reaching your target audience. It pushes us to always be doing more, striving for higher numbers, and never feel satisfied with where things are. It had me tying my self worth into the number of likes I got and that’s a losing game. Hustle culture seems to operate out of a scarcity model. In other words, there’s this sense that there’s not enough to go around, and so if you’re going to be successful, you need to “hustle hard” to get it. This, from my perspective, encourages three problematic things: 1. feeling like nothing you do is enough; 2. acting overconfident; and 3. using pressure sales Feeling Like Nothing You Do is Enough I’ve already talked about not feeling like I could do enough. It was a totally unsatisfying way of being. I was completely disconnected from gratitude, and I wasn’t doing the things that would actually nourish me on a deeper level. I had to give up the anticipation of one more follower and invest in the things that actually made me feel good, in a real way. Acting Overconfident As for acting overconfident, I see this a lot in my field. New therapists can be all too eager to prove their worth and build their practices. They end up volunteering for complex cases and a broad range of issues that may not truthfully be in their scope. The more I work in this field, the more I realize the importance of knowing our own limitations. I may want to help and be keen to learn, but that’s not the same as having the relevant training and years of experience that more complex cases truly require. It’s not the same as having the time and energy to give to each person. I now know that I’m not always the best option for each client, and that’s part of recognizing my scope as a Psychologist. I don’t say this to be humble – I say it because I’ve learned. Using Pressure Sales As a helping professional in a position of power, it’s important to me not to use pressure sales or convince people that they need to work with me. I’m one option, but I’m not the only one, and I believe part of truly informed consent needs to involve being clear about what we’re offering and the limitations of it, rather than trying to overhype ourselves or act as if there aren’t similar services out there. I believe in being really cautious about the influence I’m having on people and being very mindful about my use of power. I'm here to provide a safe, confidential place for the people who want to work with me. I’m not here to tell people what the right path for them is.
The more I thought about it, the further away from hustle culture I wanted to get. I have some clients who are entrepreneurs and I’d never tell them to hustle hard. And as clients accessing my services, I’d certainly never want them to feel hustled. So why are we uplifting hustle culture as if it’s something to strive for? I found an alternative that worked for me. I started with embracing slow growth and being satisfied with “good enough”. I also had to situate myself back in the abundance model – the belief that there are enough clients to go around for everyone. The abundance model helps remind us that we don't need to trample over our own boundaries or convince others that they need our services. Rather than hustling to compete and prove our worth, we can work to collaborate, build community, and do good work that speaks for itself. I also had to surround myself with more people who feel the way I do to help remind myself of this. I surrounded myself with others who believe in a feminist approach to marketing, which I think is much more relational and community-minded. Natalia Amari reminded me of this and I owe her a debt for that. Oh and did I gain 10,000 followers in this process of figuring all this out? No, I didn’t. But I’m less caught up in feeling like that has to happen now or I’m a total failure. I’ve re-embraced slow growth and I’ve started to feel more grounded in the work I’m putting out there as a therapist and writer. That feels like something to be proud of.
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 For those of you doing office-based work or work with clients, I know there can be a real tendency to work the whole day through without a break, continue working until the project is done, and be available to answer email or calls at all hours. With a lot of people working from home right now, the boundaries between work and home might feel even more blurry than usual, and it can be tough to turn “off” at the end of the work day. Some people are having a hard time separating from the work, and some people feel guilty when they do. The idea of setting boundaries related to work can feel daunting, and sometimes people aren’t sure where to start, so I thought I’d share some ideas to help get you thinking about the types of ways you might begin to listen to your own needs. You’ll notice that I focused mostly on physical boundaries, and mostly on boundaries that I hope will be under your control, at least to some degree. I know every workplace is different (for example, not every job allows for an hour lunchbreak, or breaks at set times), so please adapt as you need to, with the spirit of the suggestion in mind. If you do catch yourself thinking “I can’t do that at my work”, I do invite you to pause and make sure that you actually can’t. There are real barriers at work, and I completely understand that we all have to work within these limitations. Sometimes, it may the case that we’ve never thought to ask ourselves or the people in charge if it could be different. I often think back to when my dietician recommended that I have a small snack every few hours and I told her I couldn’t because I saw clients back-to-back. She asked me if I could talk to my boss about the client schedule to see if we could make it work, and of course, I had to laugh. I’m self-employed. So I know I’m particularly fortunate to be my own boss, and yet even I had trouble seeing what was possible, simply because there’s a way things had always been done. At Work:
Transitioning from Work to Home:
Some of these ideas are harder than to implement than others, and even that could be different for each person. I’m a big fan of picking one thing that seems like a small challenge but still doable, and giving it a go. You can always add more from there, when you’re ready. I had so much fun doing the recent webinars on boundary foundations that I decided to create a 5 minute video on boundaries too. In it I cover how setting boundaries is about listening to your emotional and physical needs, and I talk about finding a way of honoring those needs. Note: This was originally published in A Liberated Heart in 2018.  Ask almost anyone to name the biggest area we’re taught to put others before ourselves, and the answer will be mothering. It begins with the pressure to become a mother, to do so in a particular timeframe, and then to parent in particular ways that can feel practically impossible to live up to. Women in our culture are expected to give 100% of our time and energy to mothering, and, here’s the crucial part – we’re expected to do all with complete satisfaction and enjoyment, as if it’s our only life purpose. We’re also set up with a lot of expectations about the ways we should mother – from how our own birth experience should happen, what the names of our child should be, whether or not we should breastfeed (and how long we should try if it’s not working), to a thousand other decisions around mothering that can leave us feeling lost in a sea of other people’s opinions. We can also get lost in other people’s expectations about their own involvement – whether that’s how much access they get to the baby and what that will look like, or how much decision-making they’ll be part of when it comes to parenting. Set Up To Struggle One of the things that makes it especially hard for us during this time is that we’ve also been taught it’s not polite (or acceptable, or nice) to set boundaries with other people about their involvement in our child’s life or decisions related to mothering. So when our mother in law tells us she’s going to be present in the birthing room with us, are we allowed to tell her no? When visitors come over to see the new baby, is it okay to ask them to leave after an hour? What if we really want our sister to stay with us after the baby is born, but she hasn’t offered yet? Are we allowed to ask her? What if we really don’t want her to, but she hasn’t asked our permission before making plans to stay in our spare bedroom? Is it reasonable to talk to her about wanting something different? Maybe we feel guilty, like we’re being too needy or demanding. We don’t want to seem rude or ungrateful. We don’t want to cause waves, or unnecessary tension. We want the important people in our lives to feel like they can have a relationship with our child. The difficulty is, when we bend over backwards trying to make sure everyone else is okay, we end up exhausted and burnt out, and we may be at higher risk for postpartum depression and anxiety. One of the big lines we’ve been taught as women is that everyone else should come before us. But at this crucial time in our lives, what’s best for us and as an extension, for our baby, may not be what our extended family prefers. And so, we find ourselves in a bind. How can we prioritize our own needs while still making everyone else happy? The short answer is we can’t. For possibly the first time in our lives, we need to turn our attention toward ourselves, and ask ourselves what’s truly best for us. This is not the same as figuring out what other people want that we can also live with. We need to ask ourselves what’s best for us. Once we understand this truth, and acknowledge it, we need to find a way to honor it. Boundaries for the First Time Often, women I work with on setting boundaries around birth and motherhood are setting boundaries for the first time in their lives. As may already be clear, we can learn pretty early on in our lives (through a variety of experiences) to put the emotional needs of others before ourselves. Many women have found themselves in caregiving roles, whether in their first families or in other relationships since, and it can be difficult to recon with the notion that we might need to put ourselves first. For a lot of women, pregnancy is the first time they’re forced to act in ways others might see as selfish and make decisions that others may not agree with. Below, I wanted to share some of the big ideas I talk about with my clients when it comes to setting boundaries for the first time. You're Allowed to Want Something Other than What Other People Want Yep, I said it. You’re allowed to want something different. You’re even allowed to make decisions in accordance with those desires. Boundaries are connected to our values, and since we each have different values, what makes sense for us may not seem logical to other people. I know it’s hard. But wanting something different than someone else doesn’t have to put you at odds with each other. Most healthy adults are able to hold different opinions about important matters while still holding each other in high regard. We can understand that disagreeing with someone about an issue and still caring deeply for them aren’t mutually exclusive. We might hear from some family members ideas about what’s best (from how often we hold our baby to what our sleeping arrangements should be), but we can remind ourselves that these statements are just that person’s ideas about what’s best. And we’re allowed to have own ideas, developed from our very unique experiences and values. Ideas that we don’t need to justify or make other people understand. As I’ve talked about elsewhere, “People don’t need to understand our boundaries in order to respect them. We can state our needs and desires without explanation or apology.” If someone in your life pushes you to explain yourself, that says way more about them than it does about you, and it might also be an indicator that some healthy distance is in order. It's Okay to Protect Yourself from Unwanted Influence In those first weeks and months (and years) of motherhood, we’re very much still finding our feet as parents, and that means it’s easy to doubt what we’re doing. The parenting strategy that seemed great on paper can feel shaky when it’s time to implement. The bedtime routine that worked last month has suddenly stopped working. In times like these, I often encourage my clients to protect themselves from people who’ll just add to the doubt they’re already feeling. I’m all for learning from the women who’ve come before us, but I also think we need to be careful about who we turn to, when, and what we share. Sometimes when we’re unsure of a parenting decision we’re making, it’s not the best idea to turn to the person in our life with the strongest opinion on the subject. Instead, we want to turn to the person who can bring out our own wisdom. The person who can help us connect to our truth, our body knowledge, and find our confidence again. The person who will ask us good questions with the intent on helping us find what’s right for us (not enforcing their own view on ours). When turning to others for guidance around parenting, ask yourself, are they: • Someone whose parenting style you seek to emulate? • Able to listen and support you, even if your experiences and decisions are different than theirs? • Able to come from a position of “this is what worked for me” rather than “this is what everyone should do”? • Someone who is nonjudgmental and compassionate? • Someone who you can admit mistakes and uncertainties to without fear of judgment? If we’re speaking with someone who tends to be more pushy, judgmental, or opinionated, it’s okay to hold back, and wait until we’re feeling more certain about what we’re doing before we share with them. Even then, we may choose the types of things we want to share with them, reminding ourselves that we don’t need their blessing or their permission to parent in the way we see fit. Be Prepared for Pushback As Harriet Lerner helps us understand in “The Dance of Intimacy”, the work of boundaries is really about managing other people’s reactions to our boundaries without getting pulled back into old patterns (blaming, cutting off, or appeasing, for example). Change is hard, and if we’re speaking up or standing our ground in a new way, others may have difficulty adjusting to this. It’s pretty common for even the most loving relatives to push back a little when we do something different. We need to anticipate this pushback and plan how we’re going to manage our own reactions in the face of them. One way we can do this is to learn to hold our ground without becoming defensive, explaining, or justifying. Just how do we do this? It might involve getting rooted in our own values, and surrounding ourselves with the people, items, and practices that help us stay connected to those values. For me, it sometimes means connecting with other attachment therapists so that I can talk with someone who understands my worldview and speaks the same language. It means getting on the same page as my partner as much as possible so that we can handle difficult situations as a team. It means taking care of my health so that I can make decisions from a grounded place (and make less decisions out of scarcity, desperation, and exhaustion). Where does this lead? Ideally, we can practice turning toward ourselves and continue building a trust in our own voice. We can let go of old beliefs that we have to be pleasing, or agreeable, or understood to other people. Putting it All Together Those first years of parenting (pregnancy included!) are tough – we’re forced to confront the reality that our desires are sometimes in conflict with other people’s. For the first time we may have to use our voice, stick with our limits, and find a way to do what’s best for ourselves even in the face of other people’s disappointment. I’m often reminding my clients that we don’t need to make other people understand our parenting decisions or agree with us. What we do need to do is continue turning toward ourselves. We need to continue listening to our heads, hearts, and bodies, so that we can make conscious decisions about our mothering based on what’s the best fit for us. We will make mistakes along the way, and we’ll lose touch with ourselves from time to time, but we can trust that asking ourselves what we really need and trying to find a way to honor that will never be the wrong thing to do. References 1. Perry, N. (2017). 5 Beliefs to Support You in Setting Boundaries [Ebook]. Edmonton.
2. Lerner, H. G. (1985). The dance of anger: A woman's guide to changing the patterns of intimate relationships. New York: Harper & Row.  I think it's so neat that in addition to the amazing local, in-person resources I often share with clients, there's a ton of really cool online offerings these days. From my perspective, these can be a great adjunct to therapy or a standalone resource, depending on what you're looking for. I think these resources look amazing and hope you will too.
Over the years I’ve worked with a number of people trying to make hard decisions, and these hard decisions usually boil down to this: “should I stay or should I go?” What people struggle with most is knowing whether the situation they’re in (a workplace, a relationship, etc) is one that will get better by working on or not. I watch people struggle for months and sometimes years, caught up in the distress of trying to make a decision that’s best for them.
It’s not uncommon in my therapy office to talk about social media. Specifically, I’ve been having a lot of conversations about wanting to not be on social media but having a hard time stopping.
When people bring up the topic of their social media use, it’s usually said with a bit of a guilty look, and can come across as a shrug off comment. “I really shouldn’t be using my phone so much,” they might say in an off-hand way. But, since people are paying me money to notice things, I don’t just shrug it off. Instead, I invite them to talk about it. So many of my clients are finding that they’re on social media more than they actually want to be, and that it’s causing upset in their lives. These are some of the things we’ve been talking about in those conversations. It’s hard saying no. For a lot of new therapists, we really struggle with the idea of disappointing someone in our care.
It can be easy to feel that because our clients need something, we need to be the one to give it to them. I hear new therapists say things like “but they need evening hours – they can’t make it during the normal workday“ or “they need a sliding scale – they can’t afford the full fee”. As a partner/friend/lover/ally of someone who is working on boundaries, you may be noticing some changes. Like most changes, this can feel pretty scary and you might be unsure or hesitant about what’s happening. That’s why I wanted to write you this letter. I think it’s normal to feel afraid in times of change, especially when the change involves something unfamiliar.
As health professionals in positions of power, we have certain standards of practice we need to adhere to it in order to protect the public. The Standards of Practice of the College of Alberta Psychologists are “the minimum standards of professional behaviour and ethical conduct expected of all regulated members”[1]. These include informed consent, avoiding dual relationships, and acting within our scope, to name a few. These are incredibly important to know and adhere to, and yet it’s not enough to ensure that we’re working in a way that’s ethical and sustainable.
I want to offer some assurance for anyone struggling with setting boundaries. Ready for it? Deep breath.
It’s not your fault. Yep, I said it, and I’m going to say it again. It’s not your fault. “I don’t want to get into some kind of unhealthy codependency,” *Lydia said, referring to her new relationship.
I gave her a quizzical look. I’m familiar with the concept of codependency, but I wasn’t sure what she really meant by it. Just by what I already knew of her, it seemed like a strange thing to be worried about, so I asked her to elaborate. She went on to describe not wanting to be in a position of needing her partner, or spending “too much” time together. I knew what she was getting at. A few months ago I was facing some tension with an acquaintance (caused entirely by their unwillingness to hear my very reasonable “no” to their request), when I caught myself in a dangerous thought.
The stress of having tension between us was really getting to me, and I found myself thinking, “maybe I should just compromise after all, to make it easier”. It’s amazing it took me this long to get to the 1989 feminist therapy classic considering how hungry I've been for more voices like hers. I kept seeing it on the bookshelves of my mentors and thinking some day I should get around to it. I’m glad I finally did.
Setting boundaries starts with believing you’re worth it. Believing that you’re worth putting as a priority, and that you deserve to have your needs met. That means letting go of guilt and shame, and practicing turning toward yourself, even though it’s uncomfortable.
I often imagine conversations I'll have with my daughter when she gets older. I imagine how I might talk to her about consent, what I'll share with her about mothering, what I want her to know about friendship, and of course, what I want to help her understand about love.
Specifically, I was thinking about how I would explain my love for her. I often had conversations with my own mom where I tried to understand why she loved me, and I don't know that I ever quite got it. So if she ever asks me why I love her, this is what I came up with: In the last 5 years I've worked with more and more helping professionals and caregivers, supporting them to be a support to others. It's probably one of the things I enjoy the most, because there are so many good people out there trying to do helping work, and I've actually figured out some things that can allow them to keep doing what they're passionate about, despite the heaviness of the work. I get a little excited about this because I now know without a doubt that it is completely possible to do some amazing things without giving up your life in the process. And actually, it's not only possible, but better for everyone involved - keep in mind that we're able to do more and better work when we can still connect to our own aliveness.
So I don’t know how many of you have seen a counselor, or if you ever wonder what goes on in the world of a psychologist OUTSIDE the therapy room (“do they really do all the meditating they’re telling me is so beneficial?”) but I’ve got a little bit of insight that I’d like to share with you. I have noticed that in psychology, self care gets talked about a lot… but similar to other helping fields, the actual practice of putting ourselves as a priority is not so good. There’s a lot of TALK about work-life balance, but the structural systems within the workplace – be it nonprofit or private practice – make it really hard to actually have balance. Now, in my early 20s, I was excited enough about the work, and energetic enough, that I could “buckle down and push through”. But by the time I turned 27 – not that old – the effect of “pushing through” was starting to wear on me.
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AuthorNicole Perry is a Registered Psychologist and writer with a private practice in Edmonton. Her approach is collaborative and feminist at its heart. She specializes in healing About the Blog
This space will provide information, stories, and answers to big questions about some of my favorite topics - boundaries, burnout, trauma, self compassion, and shame resilience - all from a feminist counselling perspective. It's also a space I'm exploring and refining new ideas.
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