Anna
Hello and welcome back to the show. I’m recording my second solo episode and really excited to talk about my favorite lesson from the river, how to set boundaries. It’s my favorite because your ability to set boundaries is essential for living a life that is meaningful, powerful, fulfilling, and where you get to

Follow your passions, which I’m passionate about. And I like to think of boundaries as riverbanks. When you look at a river, the river exists because of the riverbanks. Those riverbanks create boundaries that direct the flow of the water downstream. And within that container of those boundaries, the flow

obviously flows around rocks and flows up and down and around and back upstream. And there’s a lot of beauty and power in that flow and a lot of freedom within the container of the banks. And so to me, the river teaches us all about freedom through discipline. That when we apply discipline, when we learn how to set boundaries, both with others and

even maybe more importantly with ourselves, that allows us to have more freedom in our lives. So I like to think of boundaries as setting riverbanks around what’s important to you. Setting riverbanks that direct the flow of your attention, your energy, and your focus towards what’s important to you. Because when you don’t have that container and those boundaries,

It’s easy to get distracted. It’s easy to let our flow go one way or the other, or maybe even overflow the banks sometimes. And then we end up with maybe feelings of frustration, maybe even resentment towards people or decisions ourselves for allowing…ourselves to get distracted or spend time and energy on things or people that really weren’t or aren’t aligned with what’s important to us.

So number one is to understand and get clear on what’s important to you. I that is really important because if you don’t know what’s important to you, then it’s hard to set boundaries around it. Right, so getting clear on what is important to you and that takes some reflection. You you can use journaling prompts, you can sit in reflection. You can also notice the feelings you have about certain people, certain activities that you’re spending your time on and with. And your emotions will give you a good reading on whether that’s something that aligns with what you want to create in your life. And to be clear, it’s not all about feeling blissful all the time, you know, or having it easy all the time.

Setting boundaries is hard work, focusing your attention and staying on track and staying aligned with what’s important to you is actually hard work. And sometimes it doesn’t always feel blissful because it takes something, right? Like if you want to get better at paddling or you want to get stronger, let’s say for paddling or for whatever activity you enjoy, then yeah, sometimes you need to take time to work out, maybe lift, you know, going to the gym.

So number one, get clear on what’s important to you.

And then once you have an idea, it’s time to set those boundaries. Now, when folks think about boundaries, they often think about setting boundaries with other people. And that is important. Today, we’re also gonna talk about setting boundaries with yourself, which is, as I mentioned, just as important or maybe more important because when you practice with yourself, it can get easier to practice with others.

One of the biggest things I’ve learned in my life is that it’s important, one of the biggest boundary setting lessons I’ve learned is to get comfortable with saying no, which is really uncomfortable. So saying no might be your discomfort zone. It definitely can be my discomfort zone.

It’s so important because everything you say yes to means that you’re saying no to something else because we only have so much time during the day. And so everything that you’re saying yes to means that you’re saying no to something else. And so you want to take inventory on what it is you’re saying yes to and what it is you’re saying no to.

We, you know, there’s some of you who might be caring for family members who may have, you know, responsibilities and jobs that you’re not ready to, you don’t want to say no to. And then I think it’s really important to look at that choice, right? And instead of, you feel like you’re frustrated because you say something, if you feel like you’re frustrated because you’re doing something for someone or you’re feeling resentful, just look at what you’re choosing. Because there’s times when we need to set a boundary with ourselves where we decide that this might not be ideal.

And I’m choosing this because this is important to me. I’m choosing family because this is important to me.

and not wish it were different, right? Or if I’m on the river and I’m nervous and I’m like, why am I doing this? I have to remember, well, I chose to be here. No one forced me to put on the river. I’m like, yeah, I chose to be here. So if I chose to be here, it’s because I want to be here. And so I need to align my actions and my thoughts with wanting to be here.

And we’ll get to that in a minute. I’ll get to more of that in a minute. But let’s come back to setting boundaries with others and saying no could be your discomfort zone. I know for myself, I have a fear of disappointing people. So when someone asks me to do something, sometimes I’ll say yes, because I don’t want to disappoint them when actually I don’t want to do it. And I’ve learned

a lot through those experiences. There’s experiences that I’ve said yes to more because someone reached out and saw me as a leader or saw me as

you know, asking me to take on a position or.

Let me go back to that.

I know for myself, I can sometimes say yes to things out of my fear of not wanting to disappoint people. And I learn a lot from those experiences. And the bottom line is that it’s important for me to recognize that so that I don’t spend my life saying yes to things because I’m afraid of disappointing or don’t want to disappoint someone else. And

The fact of the matter is that although they might be disappointed,

it’ll probably be fine and they’ll be fine and I’ll be fine. I’m about to give up a volunteer position with an organization that I’ve had for three years and, and leadership reached out to me and asked me if I would actually take on more leadership in the position, in a different position. And I, you know, immediately observed myself thinking, you know, I could make that work and

it wouldn’t be so bad and I could really make a difference. And it’s true, I could make a difference. And the organization is gonna be just fine without me, right? That’s the truth of the matter. Sometimes I know for myself, I’ll get into my head of thinking, they’re asking me because they really need me. No one else can do it. No one else will do it. And it’s just, you think of an Eddie on the river.

Right? The water flows into the rock and around the rock and that creates a void. And then the water comes in to fill that void. And it’s okay to leave a bit of a void in certain circumstances. For instance, this one, it’s okay for me to leave my position and leave the organization, take a break and focus on other things. And other people will step in to fill those roles. It also reminds me of when I go on a Grand Canyon River trip or any multi -day longer multi -day trip, know, 21 days, 16 days. And before the trip, I have all these worries of, my gosh, people won’t be able to reach me. I won’t be able to get back to people. You know, I hope my business is okay and on and on. And then after the river, always an amazing trip. After the river, I…

you know, get to the takeout, get to sell service and everything was fine without me being there. And I think that it’s important. That is most of the time, right? So most of the time when we really feel uncomfortable about saying no, it’s probably okay to say no. And of course there are exceptions. Everyone is different. And if there are exceptions and you are saying yes to something,

And then you start noticing yourself getting resentful, remind yourself that you chose it. And so then it’s about changing your attitude towards it, either saying no or changing your attitude towards it and committing until you do decide to say no. So I think that’s important with setting boundaries with other folks. One aspect of it at least, I mean, this

conversation could go on and on. When it comes to setting boundaries with your yourself, I think remembering that you have choice. And the other big boundary is self -talk and remembering that we’re always in conversation in life. You’re always in a conversation. You’re in a conversation either with yourself or with others. And

how you talk about yourself, about a situation, your self -talk, which has been mentioned by many guests on this podcast. Your self -talk is so important and setting a boundary around your self -talk is key. So setting riverbanks, right? That direct the flow of your self -talk towards self -talk that is aligned with who you want to become. And you might…who you want to become or what you want to have happen may not be in reality yet. And you can talk about it as if it is, you can talk about it as if you’re on your way, right? Everyone who’s achieved anything great had to have that faith, had to have that vision, visualize, know, talk about the dream before it actually was in reality.

when we keep focusing self -talk on, I’m not that good or, know, for kayakers, you know, the self -talk around like, I had to roll today. It’s like, great, do you remember the you that couldn’t do a combat roll and wish they could do a combat roll and now you’re bombed because you did a combat roll? You know, and watching that because…There’s nothing to be bummed about. And you could instead talk about it. was like, yeah, I really hit my role today. Amazing. It makes me feel confident. I’m so glad I have that down so that I could roll up and keep going and stay online. There’s different ways to talk about it and how you talk about it sets up your future self. And one thing when I noticed myself going down negative self -talk to set a boundary,  around it, I’ll say, that’s not true for me, or that’s not true for me anymore. When I notice that I’m saying stuff that is old habit patterns or not serving my goal, my current goal, and then I replace it with something that is.

And this is something that we can all practice.

And of course, the first step is awareness. Just like the first step in setting boundaries is being, having, well, actually the first step is to know who you want to become and know what your goals are and know what’s important to you. Then it’s becoming aware of what are you saying yes and no to, how are you talking to yourself about what’s going on, about yourself, about others.

about the situation and then replacing it, making a choice, starting to say no to those things that don’t align and say yes to the things that do or change and start acting upon the things that do and talking to yourself in alignment with your goals.

One of the most important or I think most effective ways to start practicing boundaries, besides noticing the self -talk, is challenging yourself with a morning routine, implementing a morning routine.

It’s that same idea. Well, it’s the philosophy of freedom through discipline. When you set those riverbanks around your morning routine, then you create freedom for yourself. When there’s no riverbanks, when you wake up at any whatever time and then you look at your phone first thing and your stress response spikes because you’re reading the news or you’re on social media or you’re reading emails,

There’s no freedom in that. You’ve essentially given all of your power away and allowed those outside influences to spike your nervous system. So you’re already starting your day off stressed. If you can set riverbanks around what time you get up, maybe a little earlier so that you have time to reflect, you set a boundary around your phone so you wait. And at first it can be five minutes.

If you’re used to waking up and looking at your phone first thing, start again, hard moves and easy water. Make it easy on yourself. Otherwise it won’t be sustainable. And then focus on a mindfulness practice that does help you align. That could be slowly sipping your morning coffee, drinking lemon water. It could be listening to nice music or sitting outside, whatever it is. It could be yoga, right? It could be going for a mindful walk, whatever it is. That’s setting up time in the morning and actually practicing setting those riverbanks so that you wake up and you set yourself up for success first thing in the morning without just giving all of your power away and saying yes to a bunch of influences that stress you out without even thinking about it.

That is a really powerful way to start practicing boundaries. I do a whole week of boundary bootcamp in my mental agility mastery eight week course and people really get a lot out of it. And I think they’re always surprised at how effective it is to start with this morning routine practice of freedom through discipline, setting those riverbanks.

Another practice that I really like obviously is yoga. I wrote a book, Yoga for Paddling. I’m a yoga teacher, big yoga. I mean, I’m a daily yoga practitioner because it helps me embody a mind. And as on previous episodes with my guests, Michael Johnson and Joe Taft both talked about, you know, the idea that yoga is not just about feeling blissful and stoked all the time and calm. Yoga is a practice of discipline for the body and the mind, which is why I really like it, appreciate it, I should say. And one other practice that actually is coming up next month that I really appreciate is cleansing, doing an Ayurvedic, I’m an Ayurvedic health coach, which is Ayurveda is the sister science to yoga. So that could be a whole other podcast episode, but doing a,

you know, five day reset of a cleanse, resets the digestive tract, resets the mind, is really powerful. I call it the most, one of the most beneficial mental agility practices you can do. Because if you’re looking at ways to like strengthen your mindset to do hard things, or if you think that running difficult whitewater is challenging for mental agility,

I challenge you to give up your favorite foods, caffeine, alcohol, sugar, whatever it is for you, for five days, simplify your meals, and give up snacking. And man, you will come face to face with doing hard things and with…

I think face -to -face with when your habit patterns aren’t in alignment with, for instance, snacking, like emotional snacking or snacking just because you’re bored. When you start to come face -to -face with that and you put a boundary around it of like, really don’t need this, then you have so much more freedom in your digestive tract, you have so much more freedom in your mind, a lot of…

brain fog actually comes from too much snacking. Again, I could do a whole episode on Ayurveda. The point is that there are ways, what I’m trying to get at is that there are ways to practice setting boundaries that look different, that are unique. So again, we can set boundaries with morning routine, with our self -talk, yoga, meditation is another one, doing a cleanse really,

challenging yourself to give something up that you’ve become attached to.

which means creating that container, those riverbanks.

and feeling the freedom within that.So again, to me, the river is a beautiful, powerful role model for teaching us how to set boundaries. The river banks, the river exists because of the river banks. The river banks provide a container that helps direct the flow of energy or that directs the flow of water, I should say, downstream.

And in our own lives, we can set our own river banks that help us to direct the flow of our energy and attention and focus toward what’s important to us, what’s important to you.

If you’re interested in learning more about these techniques for boundary setting,

I encourage you to check out my guided fall cleanse. It’s coming up next month at the time of this recording. I’m recording this in September. The cleanse is October 21st through 25th. And you can learn more about it at AnnaLevec .com slash cleanses. I’m also offering a free webinar on how to set boundaries. So if you want to dive a little deeper into this conversation,

There’s a lot more we can talk about.
I’ll be hosting that webinar on Zoom on November 4th at 7 p East Coast time.

So come join then. And as I mentioned, my mental agility mastery eight week course is coming up in January. So you can check that out also on my website.

Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for sharing the podcast with your friends and family. Thank you for reviewing and rating the podcast if you love it. I appreciate your help in getting it out to more folks. And I hope you have a great week of practicing boundary setting and would love to hear how it’s going for you.