I said no.

And it was awesome.

I said no, my dearest reader.
And it was awesome.

Here’s a story which I hope makes you feel supported in saying no, too, and maybe even letting yourself enjoy it.

Let me take you back to my 30th birthday.

My mom, whom I haven't been in contact with for the past 10 years, decided to send me a text message that morning. And let's just say, there was nothing resembling a ‘happy birthday’ to be found in there - trust me, I've looked. 😬

It was not how I had hoped my 30th birthday would start, to say the least.

That day, a few people asked me: Why haven't you blocked her yet? And I didn't really have an answer. Except for: hope.

Hope she might one day have some kind of epiphany and start to do the inner work and we can have something resembling a healthy relationship after all.

I know, I know, after 10 years, that hope is no longer founded in any way, but hey, that’s not what hope’s about. 🙃

So I did what the decision making experts recommend, and that’s imagining your life AFTER you’ve made the decision, after you did the thing, after you said yes or, in this case, after you did not put the boundary in place.

And then, asking yourself: Is this helping me achieve the things that I value at a cost that I’m willing to bear?

NO #1

Until now, the costs hadn’t been that clear to me, so I valued the hope I could hold onto more. But now the costs suddenly had gotten very tangible.

The next day I woke up and I knew what to do.

👉🏻 I value having my own independent life devoid of my mom’s condescension and influence of any other kind. A LOT. And this is very much worth saying goodbye to the hope of this magical phone call that will probably never come.

So, I bid farewell to those dream scenarios and I blocked her. And there are no words to describe the freedom I felt (and still do, more than a year later). 💃🏻

Shortly after, it turned out that there were some more noes in my life eager to be handed out.

NO #2

First, I got offered a freelance job. There were so many reasons to say yes (like helping people and making money), except for one very important one: I did not want to. 😬

And you know what made this one so important? The reasons for saying yes were not coming from within, they were learned. The reason for saying no came from my core.

I pretty soon figured out that I’d choose filling my days with doing the work I love over people-pleasing and making money by doing something I definitely do not love every single time. So I did. 💪🏻

NO #3

The last ‘no’ was going to an acquaintance who asked me a little too big of a favor. And this was a hard one, because the price I would be paying for saying no, was disappointing someone. And that’s a hard pill to swallow for every recovering people-pleaser. 😭

So, I reminded myself of this VERY important truth: You're not deciding between disappointing this person or not, you're deciding between disappointing this person OR yourself.

I also asked myself who I wanted to be, and that’s someone who holds their own happiness in high regard and does the courageous things to protect their time and energy.

I want to grow my self-trust and feel like I can count on me.
And that means I need to show myself that I can.

Reframing boundaries

While writing this, I opened Set boundaries, find peace by Nedra Glover Tawwab to a random page and read this list of ways to reframe the process of setting boundaries:

Boundaries are a way of advocating for yourself.
Boundaries are a way to maintain the health and integrity of a relationship.
Boundaries are a way of saying ‘‘I love myself’’.

Especially this last one really hit home for me. Because you know what I did right before I blocked my mom? I wrote down a few sentences as a way to say goodbye. And the last two were:

‘‘I still love you. But I love me more.’’